Belly Dancing

It's the most magical feeling of any -- to feel the baby moving in my belly. except in the case of my "baby cantalope" (i.e. the approximate size of the baby at this point, according to TheBump.com), I'm convinced that my baby is dancing in my belly.

Seriously. This vision of half-baked, dancing baby-in-belly all started a couple of weeks ago. I was at my monthly doctor's appointment, and my doc decided to check the baby via ultrasound, instead of using the dopplar-thing. It was a quick ultrasound peek, just to see the baby move and the baby's heartbeat. But I got more than that. I got jazz-hands. Oh yes I did! The baby did jazz hands.

I went home and told my disbelieving husband. He was certain that what I perceived to be "jazz hands" was really a reflection of the poor ultrasound resolution. That is - until later that afternoon when we went to our high-def ultrasound appointment. As the ultrasound technician meticulously viewed and measured each organ, my baby did it again. The jazz hands. And my hubby saw it first hand. The child's got natural rhythm....what can I say (except what I can say is that the baby got it from my side of the family. trust me on this one.)

So as I'm mid-way through the infanticipation, I'm basking in the joyous pleasure of feeling my baby dancing in my belly. And I'm also glad at the satisfaction of knowing for certain that all those funny feelings I'm getting in my belly is definitely the baby, and not gas :-)

Infanticipating

I still can't believe that I'm infanticipating, yet I'm about half-way through the pregnancy. When I catch a glimpse of my baby bump in the mirror, it feels like an out-of-body experience. It's as if I'm looking at someone else, but it's really me! And it's not like this is my first pregnancy. Maybe it feels so surreal cuz I'm just so tired all the time that my head's too foggy to get a grip.

And it's amazing how much more exhausting this pregnancy is. It just goes to show what a few years older + life with a toddler + full time job + being the "best" wife in the world ;-) does to your energy level. Even still, I'm savoring and enjoying this pregancy...as exhausted as I am on most days. The baby is starting to move more often and it's just the most magical feeling. Words can't describe.

Safe Haven

for some, going #2 at work is a big ordeal. ideally, you'd do it in the privacy of your own home, but when you gotta go, you gotta go, even if it means going at work.

it happens all the time. you're working away when you start to feel a lil rumbling...yeah, something's stirring alright! but you don't want to go to the bathroom until it's just about time to make the drop. (like, it's at the "door," if you know what I mean ;) let's face it. if you go to take a seat in the ceramic office too soon, you run the risk of clamping up the moment you hear someone enter the bathroom. clamp up -- game over. hello, constipation!

so there are a couple of strategies to productive poops in office: timing and location

timing: so there's timing in the sense of going to the ceramic office prematurely, as mentioned above. then there's the time of day. I can tell you with 100% certainty when not to go - don't go just before lunch time, starting around 11:30 or just after lunch time (anytime between 12:30-1:15). too much traffic in the bathroom and too much chit-chat. oh, and maybe avoid the 9-10am hour. you know how it is. after that morning cup of coffee, sometimes it makes you want to "drop off kids at the pool"...and P.S. -- you're not the only one drinking cafe in the morning, so you won't be the only one dropping off kids in the late morning time. also avoid going 10 minutes before the hour. you'll find people making a pit stop before their next meeting. generally speaking, there's little to no bathroom traffic in the early part of the 4 o'clock hour. everyone's too busy trying to wrap stuff up for the day to take potty breaks.

location, location, location: like buying good real estate, location matters. when it comes to strategic pooping, location matters on 2 dimensions: the bathroom location within the building and stall location inside the bathroom. both are important considerations for a good dump. for instance, in the building where I work, many of us unknowingly deemed the 1st floor women's bathroom as a "safe haven." you see, the cube farm on the first floor is much smaller relative to the other floors. so it would seem that the traffic to the ladie's restroom would be minimal. wrong! first of all, though the cube farm is smaller on that floor, most of the inhabitants are female. second, apparently other ladies in the building came to the same false conclusions, so they trek down to the 1st floor to drop a load. case in point: my cube neighbor gleefully announced that she was going to the "safe haven" one day. she and I thought the "safe haven" was our little secret. until that day! she goes to the "safe haven" only to discover another cube farm inhabitant from our same floor was there dropping off kids too! they each knew exactly what the other was doing...the plop-and-splash sounds were unmistakable. lesson: when possible, avoid doing the doo in the restrooms on floors with a disproportionate number of women.

as for the second aspect of location -- stall location inside the bathroom -- just don't pick the Frequently Used Stall (F.U.S.). you know the one...it's the one that you inexplicably veer into without giving it a single thought. in the restroom on my floor, for example, the F.U.S. is the first one on the left. don't know why. it just is. even if you drop and flush right away to minimize the stink, you have to avoid the F.U.S. just out of consideration for the next person who comes into the bathroom. nine times out of ten, that person will go to the F.U.S. and you don't want the lingering aroma of your deed to cause that person to gasp for air. not to mention, that the person who unknowingly went in to the gassed out F.U.S. will eagerly tell the next person coming in, "it wasn't me!" just to clear the air, so to speak. some of us (myself included) are kind of childish when it comes to office pooping and will go so far as naming the offender to anyone who'll listen. and the story will be re-told with slight embellishment time after time, the ingenue of the story never shaking the label of being the offender that dropped a real one at work that stunk up the whole place.

Facebook "Friend" Farming??

something suspicious is going on. over the last few weeks, on an almost-daily basis, I've been receiving random Facebook friend requests. these requests are coming from people who seem to be on the other side of the world. even though I've ignored all the requests, I can't quite shake the notion that something about this sudden influx of friend requests is not right.

here's my suspicion: with the rising, meteroic rise in popularity of Facebook (and Twitter, for that matter), I think there's an underground, shady business of Facebook "friend farming." could it be that there are people out there who are being paid to build up a huge friend base that will be ultimately "sold" somehow for commercial uses? (or something along those lines...)

why would Muhammad Noor Akbar Shabir send me a friend request??? who are you? who's your daddy? and what does he do?!?!

I'm just saying...something ain't right here.

toddler-speak

my 2 1/2 year old toddler is now fully conversant. it's a treat to have complete conversations with her, although it does require some "translation" at times. here are translations of some of my toddler's chatter:

• "refrigilator" = refrigerator
• "eleventeen" = eleven
• "pie-brow" = eyebrow
• "bathing soup" = bathing suit
• "bup-bup" = butt
• "mo-kee-yo" = Pinocchio
• "pack-cack" = backpack
• "boops" = boobs
• "bandee" = bandaid
• "lellow" = yellow
• "chalk-skits" = chopsticks
• "new-gitz" = music
• "boo-berry" = blueberry
• "coonchalada" = ??? (we're still trying to figure out this one...she uses it interchangeably as a noun, verb and adjective)
  

then there are her expressions that...well, need no translation:

• "did I make a clogger?" - when flushing the poo from her little potty into the toilet
• "meenie-meenie-mynie-mo...catch a tiny-tiny-toe. my mama picks...YOU!" - her interpretation of "eenie-meenie-mynie-mo..."
• (while patting my butt) - "mama, do you have poos?"
• "do you have boogers?"
• "excuse me! did you fart?"
• "get out of my bupp, poo's" - when sitting on the potty to go #2
  

she seems to have a strange facination with bodily functions. but I suppose she had to learn that somewhere...clearly she learned it from her daddy :-)

P.I.P.

two days ago, my little toddler girl made her very first P.I.P. -- Poo In Potty. I didn't want to mention it right away. didnt want to jinx it. but today, she had her 2nd P.I.P. so I'm hoping that this is not just one, poop fluke.

and I have to say this: the first P.I.P was ginormous! it was an adult-sized poo that came out of my petite daughter's bum-bum. no joke.

so large, in fact, that it clogged the toilet! after dumping the poo from the little potty to the toilet and flushing, the toddler said: "did I make a clogger mama?" she was strangely delighted by the bloop-bloop-bloop sound of a clogged toilet trying to flush.

clogger aside, we were so overjoyed by her first P.I.P. my baby-daddy and I jumped up and down, hootering and yelping out of joy...you'd think we won the lottery!

adventures in potty training

BIG milestone today. my lil toddler went to daycare wearing "big girl chonies" for the first time today. And...[wait for it....] NO POTTY ACCIDENTS! That's my girl!

all day long, while toiling away at work in corporate america, I was distracted, wondering: "did my lil one wet herself? is she gonna be upset? are the 3 extra outfits and 2 pairs of chonies that I put in her cubbie gonna be enough to get her through the day at day care today?"

I felt so anxious as I left the office at the end of the day and drove to pick her up. I'd know right away whether or not she made it through the day "dry", based on her outfit when I pick her up.

as I approached the playground, my eyes scanned the scattered crowd of toddlers as quickly as I could, trying to spot my girl. and then there she was -- in the same deliciously cute outfit she was wearing when I dressed her in the morning. SUCCESS! and the added bonus - her little piggy-tails were a bit tweaked out... a sign of a good, fun day at "school" for her.

we celebrated by going to In-N-Out for a "hamberg" (that's little shorty's way of saying "hamburger") and french fries.

next: adventures in potty training, part 2 - P.I.P (Poo In Potty)