A is for Beautiful

Only four more hours…although I have a list a mile long of things to do today, I am also still very thrilled to be getting out of school for a week and a half. I had some major anxiety issues last night though. I don’t know what it was I just woke up at 3:15 am and couldn’t go back to sleep because I was too busy making lists in my head and “remembering” things. I finally fell back asleep (I don’t know when) and never woke up when Jonathan got in the shower. Thank goodness he woke me up before he left. Besides, Julianna was so active yesterday it did make it a little more difficult to sleep.

Well, we are going to look at some carpet next week and maybe we’ll have the sofa and carpet in January. We’ll also probably get some trees cut down in January. I’m trying to convince Jonathan to have Lasik eye surgery before the baby’s born. It will just work out really well if they can finance it for us like they did for my surgery. It just makes sense for him at least to go have the 2.5 hour consultation while I can drive him and since I’ll already be there next week for my one year follow-up appointment that would make it easy. I just know that once this little girl is born all of our money will go to her and while we can we should try to do things for us. I don’t want that to sound selfish I just want to be realistic about our spending in the future. A long time ago we had a “list” anyway of things that we wanted to do for us before we had children. If we can get some of these things done for January then I would say that we did pretty well. We haven’t done everything we said we’d like to, but we certainly made a dent.

Today is Karen’s birthday so we’ll probably go out to dinner tonight. Tomorrow morning I have to take the glucose screening test where they make me drink this sugary sweet liquid and then test my blood sugar levels every few minutes to make sure that I don’t have gestational diabetes. My only concern is that the doctor advised me to not eat an abundance of carbs the day and morning before and not to fast before the appointment either. She suggested a breakfast of toast, eggs, and maybe bacon. Well, I don’t really eat any of that so I’ll have to be careful in what I eat tonight and think of something halfway decent for tomorrow morning. It’s really hard not to eat carbs this time of year though!

So I’ve been meaning to get by Babies R Us and fix our baby registry since the dumb thing got messed up - long story. I might take the time this afternoon since we have a half day to go by there and ask them to delete the old registry. I was also thinking about looking at their gliders again and asking if there’s any way that they can order a Dutalier glider. That would be nice since I know that we will have gift cards from there and I would love to order it shortly after Christmas. Most things require a six week lead time and I want to make sure that we have it by March.

I started on my lesson plans yesterday afternoon. I accomplished something, but in the grand scheme of things it doesn’t seem like much. I got 7th grade plans done through the first week in March. Seventh grade is the easiest since I’ve already had one group all the way through and I can just repeat the plans. I am going to try to finish the 7th grade year’s worth of plans today and already have them in a notebook. Then I will move on to another grade over break. I have scheduled myself two full days dedicated to working only on lesson plans. I have also scheduled one whole day of scrapbooking. YIPEEE!

OK I know I am starting to ramble. I will go now. more tomorrow…

I can’t believe that it’s almost 2006. I am really starting to feel old. It’s strange to think that Julianna will think that the 1900s were so long ago and that she will never experience the 20th century. That’s right, isn’t it? The 20th century? That sounds weird. Anyway, I only have one day of school left. We get out tomorrow at noon and I cannot wait. I am so very excited! I remember what it feels like to walk out of your last exam and that weight is off your shoulders. That’s one reason why I love being a teacher - I get to experience that every fall and spring. Plus it’s nice to have that time to recharge.

The head of the hospitality committee just came to me to let me know that they’re planning a baby shower for me and the other teacher on staff who’s wife is pregnant. She said it would be on January 16th. Yippee skippee! I wish the people here didn’t feel like they were obligated to do that for us, but I know that that’s the purpose of the hospitality committee and I figured that they would. It is very nice.

January seems like it will be a busy month. That’s one reason why I guess I’m starting to feel a lot of pressure to get my lesson plans done before then. I only have 13 weeks left and the websites are saying that I should start reading up on the signs of labor and start packing for the hospital just in case. I can’t believe that it’s time to think about that already! I did sign Jonathan and I up for that Birth and Beginnings class at the hospital for two hours every Monday night in January. That should be interesting. We are also supposed to get our new couch at the end of January. Whooo-hoooo!

Well, I don’t know anything else today. Hope everyone has a great day!

I enjoyed a couple of snow days and delays last week, which was very nice. I had a busy weekend and wasn’t feeling very well so I especially appreciated the extra time off. It’s also nice because I don’t have to make up any of the days that we miss since I will be out on maternity leave. :) Of course that means days without pay, but at this point I don’t care.

I had a great weekend too. Despite being sick I managed to make it through the student council party Friday night and my dear husband was nice enough to chaperone with me. We had a wonderful lunch on Saturday to celebrate Whit’s graduation. She has her second interview with a Forsyth County school tomorrow and maybe will have a decision by then. Then on Sunday we went to church and another Christmas party. Only 2 days left and school is out! I can’t wait because I have to have some time to get started on these lesson plans.

Today should be a great day. Eight years ago today, my hubby and I went on our first “date.” It also helps that I only have 2 classes today because of high school exams and a 6th grade field trip to see “The Chronicles of Narnia.” Even though I have to work at curves tonight I should get a lot done because of the extra planning time. I want to try to get my grades all done and entered into the grading system. Then I should be able to start on lesson plans for March.
Well, I was up to 20 lbs this morning. It makes me sad, but I suppose it could be worse. Maybe after Christmas I will “lose” a pound or two. At least I haven’t had any nosebleeds since we got the humidifier and nasal spary last week. On Thursday last week Whitter helped me move a lot of the baby stuff into the nursery. We organized all of the baby clothes that I have gotten and now I just need to start washing them. A friend that works here for the church came and offered me two nice infant car seats this morning. He said that the church gave them to him last year when they had their baby and she’s already outgrown them. I thought that was really nice and we haven’t gotten any of that kind of stuff yet so I am excited.

My doctor’s appointment yesterday went very well. I got to hear the heart beat again which is always fun. I have now gained 18.5 pounds which she said wasn’t bad. I just hope I can only gain 0.5- 1.0 pounds per week for the rest of the pregnancy. I want to only gain a total of under 30. They also told me that my blood pressure was good and that my belly was measuring perfectly. When I asked about all of the nose bleeds she said that I need to get a humidifier and put it in the bedroom and also use some saline nasal spray about ten times a day which sounds oh-so-exciting. Anyway, I go back in about ten days for the glucose screening test for gestational diabetes.

I put the rest of the pictures up from the girl’s baby shower for me. Most of them are blurry, but they’re still worth looking at. I have a lot going on for the rest of the week and I’m really not sleeping very well. I will be very thankful when next week gets here. I have a long staff meeting and student council meeting today. Tomorrow I work at curves. Friday is the Middle School 7-11 Christmas party and Saturday Whit’s graduation thingy. Sunday is the Glenola Christmas play and Memamma’s get-together. Only 5 days of school left and under 100 ’til we meet Julianna! :)

During my first class yesterday my sweet 8th grade girls class planned a surprise baby shower for me. I had no idea they were doing it and it totally caught me off guard. I’m shocked that they managed to keep it a secret from me since I overhear their conversations every day. Anyway, just before class another teacher came and got me and said, “Come with me for just a minute.” While she took me down the hall making odd small talk the girls set up my classroom. Apparently they had asked the Middle School Principal to call me out for a bit but then when she got stuck in a meeting they just asked another teacher to do it. So I came back around the corner and the lights are out and I can hear them all giggling in my classroom. They screamed, “Surprise!” at the top of their lungs (which I am SURE that everyone in the school heard) and showered me with gifts and attention the whole period. Even if it was just to get out of doing work, I was honored and thrilled. I love my kids. They had gotten cake squares, made punch, sprinkled confetti all over the place, bought gifts, and even taken up a collection for a gift card to Babies R Us. And when it was time for class to end several cleaned everything up and others took the gifts to my car and tied balloons to the antennas and put the banners on the windshield. They are so sweet and as much as I hate to say it, I am going to miss them in April and May. I did get a lot of offers for babysitting though. Check out the pictures page; I put a few pics up last night. :)

I keep reading about how you’re supposed to enjoy all of the attention that you get when you’re pregnant because that is one of the last times that people pay attention to you instead of the baby, and I sure am enjoying it. I can imagine how Julianna is only going to get more attention when she arrives, but I can’t imagine how that will bother me that she’s getting the attention and I’m not. Ok, I know, I say that now and you think I will regret it later, but we’ll just have to see.

Last night I looked in the mirror and noticed all of this nasty facial hair that I have started accumulating around the side burn area. At first it was hilarious and Jonathan and I had a good laugh, but then I kept looking at it and it just became disgusting! I look like a wooly mammoth! At least it’s not dark though!

I have another doctor’s appointment today. I also go back in a week and a half for the glucose screening test and then in January my appointments start every two weeks instead of every four. My arm hurts from the flu shot yesterday and they’re going to tell me that I’m super fat today, but I guess I can’t do anything but complain about that.