Thanksgiving Happenings

Thanksgiving weekend went by in a flash like always.

We headed to Toledo to Brian's grandpa's on Wednesday afternoon. We left at 1:00 pm and drove the 512 miles in 9 and a half hours. We had about an hours worth of stops in this trip. I took an apple pie with us, having an excuse to finally use my new pie carrier. We then got a really good nights sleep there.

On Thursday, we had lunch with all the Eddies (except Brian's dad who wasn't feeling well). We then drove the couple of hours to my great uncle Dave's house and had dinner with most of the Banters. My sisters then dragged me to see a late showing of New Moon. I made them wait a whole week since its opening, and Erin couldn't stand to wait anymore. Brian and I spent the night at my Banter grandparents this night.

Grandpa woke us up with good smells of pancakes and a roaring fire on Friday morning. I then did a little bit of Black Friday shopping with my grandma, mother, and sister. And shared an awesome Butterfinger milk shake with Erin. I'd never really had a milk shake before, and this one definitely made me get ideas for my new blending obsession. I got to hit up East of Chicago later that evening with Mariah and Ashley. We really could just talk for days and never be totally caught up with each other. Too bad we can't see each other more. Brian avoided these girly activities by spending time with his siblings, and watching a new toilet get installed. It was his parents birthday gift. Cori enjoyed playing with her cousins. I absolutely love this picture that I stole from Emily... Cori looks like she is such a good girl. We spent this night at my parent's house. Saturday put us back in the car driving to Uncle Charlie and Aunt Marrianne's. We made pretty good time, and enjoyed the Hutson Thanksgiving there at noon. There were at least half a dozen kids under 2 there... the Hutson family has been exploding with kids lately. Our boy will have plenty of older second cousins to play with, most of them boys. Being the dork that I am, I decided to graph this population growth. This chart shows the growth (through marriages and births) since I started dating Brian nine years ago. We got a couple of our first official baby gifts here, including this beautiful quilt from Brian's godmother.
This is a graph of the family since I started dating Brian in 2000. I'm one of the data from 2006.We then had to leave early to head to Fort Wayne for my cousin's wedding. The wedding was held at a Lutheran church in Fort Wayne, and the reception at the Hayloft in Hoagland. I really liked this venue, and we had a really good time at the wedding. The dj did a good job of getting us all dancing and having fun. Everything was really nice and pretty. I was dead on my feet by the end of it. We headed back to Huntington and spent the night at Brian's house.



Sunday we awoke to the smell of pancakes again. Brian's dad sent us off with a breakfast of these and some maple syrup to go. We later realized we should have been cooking for him, considering it was his and Brian's mom's birthday! After a stop to fill our cooler with meat, we headed back to Newark. We left at 10:08 am, drove the 615 miles through the day, and got to Newark at 10:28 pm. The worst traffic was where the Pennsylvania turnpike runs along with 70. We made a total of six stops that took about an hour and a half altogether (including lunch at Steak & Shake).

And after a very tiring work day on Monday, we vowed to never get back within 10 hours of having to be at work.

Blenders Amaze Me

So, Rachel Ray inspired me to try another fall soup recipe this year. This one called for the ingredients to be blended with an immersion blender in the final step. I have never used one, but really wanted an excuse to buy one, so when my mom sent me a Target birthday card for the exact amount of an immersion blender I wanted, I finally had an excuse Brian couldn't argue with. (He thinks I get too many kitchen gadgets that our tiny kitchen can't handle and I never use. I say we can deal with it.)

I picked out this immersion blender while I was down in Dover for a training earlier this week, and hunted down the vegetables I would need to slice and dice for the soup Tuesday and Wednesday. Technically, I never did find celery root. My encyclopedic husband tried to tell me that celery root was just a fancy name for celery. I however, have discovered that it is a different ingredient altogether.

On Wednesday night I commenced making the soup-remembering why I made Brian cut up the butternut squash last year (it is impossible!). By the time my husband got home (soaking wet from the rain), the soup was just about ready to be completed. I was too skittish to actually try my new gadget, so I let Brian do the honors. He had a lot of fun with it. Luckily, I picked out a really good one, that was pretty powerful. And we had a pretty good, healthy soup, full of nutrients, blended to perfection.

Following that episode, I decided I should actually use our full size blender as well. We got this awesome one from Brian's Aunt Linda for our wedding, and it hasn't got to see much counter space. On Friday morning I made a strawberry/orange smoothie that Brian said tasted like Jamba Juice (which is just what I was going for-I wish we still had these in DE). It amazes me how the blender can combine all the ingredients so quickly with just the turn of the switch.

Now I'm looking for more recipes so I can keep blending...

Last Birthday before the baby...

Brian took me out to Ole Tapas for my birthday. We haven't been here since our anniversary when I told Brian we were expecting, but we had the same waitress and table, and just as good a time. I always like taking pictures of the food here. The menu had a lot of new things and we tried a few new tapas. Our entire dinner included:

• Chefs Complement: an eggplant tapa
• A trio of cheeses including: Valdeon, Queso Jerezano (seared Miti Caña goat cheese with Sherry reduction), and Curado Pimenton

• The Empanada of the day
• Chiluetas Cordero (baby lamb chop)

• Higos Cabrales (bacon wrapped figs with Cabrales)

• Serrano Croquetas (ham croquettes)
• Fish N Chips (the only one we don't recommend.... we're not big fans of smelt apparently)
• Bread Pudding & Espresso (with cinnamon ice cream)

We had a little more ice cream at home, so I could make my birthday wish.

We also hit up the Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia on Saturday afternoon. It is a pretty cool marketplace, you see a glimpse of it in National Treasure (when the girl is hiding from the bald guy). We ate a gold old fashioned meal served by Amish women at the rib place, and browsed the many cheese and meat counters. We bought a few spices at the Spice Terminal, and some more seeds for Brian to plant our own herbs. We also took part in the Unforgotten Food festival, mostly so Brian could have some Teaberry ice cream. Apparently, teaberry is a local thing, it grows on the mountains in PA. Brian loves it. We tried a few other things, including another local specialty:  Pepper Pot Soup. I'm now looking for a recipe for this tasty dish, preferably one that doesn't include tripe.

25 at 25

I'm almost to the last third.... here I am 25 weeks pregnant at 25 years old.

Cori wanted in the picture too!

Halloween 2009

Through 23 weeks...

My due date is calculated from about May 15, 2009. I don't think I really started showing at all until about week 16, and even then it is marginal. The baby really moved in the past few days and seems to really be showing now. I do pretty good covering it up at school with cardigans.

This baby has already been a lot of places...

2 Weeks - Rehoboth Beach

4 weeks - Atlantic City7 weeks - Ohio

11 weeks - Montreal, Canada

16 weeks - Baltimore, MD

21 weeks - New York state

23 Weeks-At home in Delaware

Is molasses bad for dogs?

I just went by the table, and noticed a torn up paper towel on the floor. I couldn't figure out why it would be there, but it looked like Cori had definitely done it. Then I realized it must have been the paper towel that had been used to cook cookies on earlier in the day. When I let Brian know what his puppy had been up to, he asked if I had moved the cookies off the towel. That was when it hit me that she didn't just shred a towel, but she had pulled about a dozen cookies off the table and eaten every bit of them. There wasn't even a crumb left. This should make for an interesting night.

Cupcakes and Cocoa and Coffee

On Wednesday I wanted to see my husband during the daylight. I leave before the sun comes up, and he is normally not home until the sun goes down. The only time I see him in the sunlight is on the weekends. So to lure him away from his laboratory I met him at DBI with cupcakes and cocoa and coffee. To do this I had to face two experiences I normally don't encounter. Ordering cocoa and ordering coffee. I traditionally don't drink hot chocolate, but I was thirsty, it was cold, and the worker at the cupcake shop really made it sound good, so I ordered some. With whipped cream. It was very odd for me, but it was really delicious. I think Brian's love of chocolate is alive and well in his son, because I've never wanted as much chocolate as I have during this pregnancy. Then I had to go across the street to Starbucks and order coffee there for the first time ever. I don't drink the stuff, but Brian is an addict and has at least a few cups a day, so I went through the torture of ordering there so I could bring it to my husband. Apparently I overestimated in getting him a large (I refuse to say Venti), but other than that he had no complaints.

And apparently that might have been the last time in a while we could have sat outside comfortably to eat. It has been freezing and raining most the rest of the week.

Little Pond State Campground, Catskills

One of the downers about Delaware is that we don't get a Fall Break (compared to the week or two that Arizona gets). However, this year we got a 4-day weekend for Columbus day due to furlough days that were originally professional development days. As soon as that schedule change was announced, we started planning for our annual autumn camping trip.

Brian has been wanting to get a little farther away, so we made New York the fifth state we've camped in by heading up toward the Catskills. Brian found a nice little campground called Little Pond State Campground, and reserved site number 3.

We left Saturday morning, and drove about four and a half hours to find the red and gold colors of fall in New York state.

Brian cooked great food all weekend, and kept a good fire to keep me warm. We went for a very, very long hike on Sunday, and paid for it with cramping legs in the cold tent in the middle of the night, but other than that it was pretty enjoyable. It was our first time camping with Cori, and she did a great job. It was pretty amusing when she whined to get in to the empty tent so she could take a nap on the blankets. We spent a lot of time enjoying our alone time, and talking about this little babe that is going to change our lives very, very soon.

The weekend went by way too quickly.

We stayed at Little Pond until the last seconds of our reservation, and then headed back home taking a more scenic route. We just used the atlas and the straightest lines possible, rather than the mapquest directions that got us there. We visited a few covered bridges, and found a good cafe to stop at for lunch, Chrissie's Corner Store in Matamoras, PA. Brian was dieing for coffee, and I had been wanting ice cream for days, so we spent a good hour looking for a place that would serve both. We finally stumbled across the Inside Scoop, where Brian was very excited to get teaberry ice cream. Apparently, he loves that flavor.

Pregnancy Update

So I'm over half way done now! I'm going on my 22nd week. The baby is almost a foot long and almost a pound in weight. It will grow pretty quickly from here on out. I've definitely noticed it growing in the last few weeks when I had to totally switch to maternity clothes. And it's (he's) been kicking since the beginning of October. (It is apparently hard for me to use the proper pronoun.) We do have a name that we call him, but it is only the "womb name," not what we plan to put on the birth certificate. It is very stressful trying to come up with one, so I'm not going to try until 2010. Right now, I'm just waiting on the kicks to be strong enough that Brian can feel them.

Milburn Orchard: Apple Season

Last spring when we were driving around the countryside of Newark we ran across Milburn Orchards and planned to go back. A few Sundays ago we heard that apples were ripening, and headed over to get some. I loved this place! After much debate, we got a small bucket of honey crisp apples. They were great on their own, and the rest made there way into this delicious-o pie.

Meding & Son Seafood

This is a very big propeller that we have passed many times when we are going to the southern parts of the state. Recently, we needed to meet somewhere between Middletown (where I work) and Lewes (where Brian was studying in a class on the beach) to go to a rainy high school football game. Brian had the idea that we finally eat here. Apparently the place with the big propeller is called Meding & Son Seafood. We actually planned to get carry out because we weren't going to have enough time to make kick-off. It was definitely a nice place to go, and Brian enjoyed his Crab Mama (though really should have got the Crab Daddy), and I really liked the Old Bay seasoned french fries.

Cori is growing up so fast.

She's in a slightly awkward stage here. She really loves laying on blankets.

National Aquarium in Baltimore

About a month ago, we ventured out to Baltimore on a very warm Saturday to visit the aquarium and harbor there. Brian and I had a good time spending the day together. The aquarium was almost good enough to earn the expensive entry fee. There were lots of different exhibits focusing on different habitats. There was also:

-a 4-D show in the immersion theatre (lots of surprised/screaming children)

-a dolphin show: Our Ocean Planet (always amazing to watch these creatures)

-the jellies exhibit: Jellies Invasion: Oceans out of Balance (who doesn't love a jelly fish?)

We also spent some time strolling around the Inner Harbor. It was packed with bustling people.

We're thinking the babies room is going to have an ocean, under-the-sea theme, so I'm thinking my sister should make us one of these for her arts and crafts project for next year. They are so cute. We found them in the gift shop.

I bought a blue baby book yesterday

So we fiiiiiiinally shared the news with everyone. Now our little secret is public knowledge.

We had our ultra sound Monday, and they decided I wasn't quite as far along as we thought and bumped my due date back to Feb. 21. They took lots and lots of measurements of every part of the little ones anatomy, and Brian got pretty excited when the tech said that his hands were in little fists. I didn't notice the slip, but I think he was paying more attention to that than I was. She later pointed out those other parts of the anatomy that did indicate "it" is a boy. I was a little bummed, but Brian was very excited. I think he was very scared of having a daughter after knowing me and my 3 sisters in our teenage years. He's very happy to have a son.

So I am still pretty symptom-less in this pregnancy. I'm starting to get my appetite back-but am being very, very picky. Brian made me a dish last night of hot ham (I won't eat it cold), grapes, tomato slices, and a chunk of cheese. I do have some headaches, head cold symptoms and have been waking up a few nights with charlie-horses in my calves, but I'm not sure which and if any of those are associated with the pregnancy.

I am highly emotional though right now, which I definitely blame on the pregnancy. It's normally whenever I'm alone, but there have been many songs on the radio or scenes on tv that just make me tear up and have a tightening in my chest. Just now I was looking through some Better Homes and Gardens magazine and was moved by all the displays of pumpkins and other autumn delights... almost to tears but not quite this time.

I just heard bike pedals so my husband is approaching... he is only slightly wet from coming home in the rain. He made the best smelling stew ever this morning that slow-cooked all days, so I am going to go enjoy that with him... I'm definitely using the eating-for-two excuse tonight.

On the way...

8/9: I'm starting this blog Aug. 9, but I know I probably won't be posting it for quite a while still. I'm ready to start talking about the upcoming event that will be happening sometime around Feb. 10. --

Tiffany and I have something in common.

I learned a few weeks ago that a friend I went to middle school and high school with is expecting her first in February. So am I.

When my mother and friends were out here at the very end of the school year, I started suspecting that we might finally be pregnant. We've been trying somewhat since January, so it was about time. I've taken many p.t.s in the past when I felt even a day late, so I held off this time and really waited until it was worth the $5 test. Around June 15 I took 3 tests, and confirmed that it was really finally time. With Father's Day approaching, I wanted to wait to tell Brian, but I am of course always too impatient for that. So instead, I planned on telling him when we went out for our 3 year anniversary.

As I've already recounted, we went out to Ole Tapas to celebrate our 3 years together. Even though I'd already told Brian that I was still on a water-only-as-far-as-liquids-go-diet, he wanted to order us a bottle of wine, so I discouraged but let him, not wanting to ruin the surprise. Most people that know me know that I like to give out lots of cards, so he wasn't too surprised when I had a whole stack for him. After he received his anniversary card, and early father's day cards from the cat and new puppy, he found out he'd have to drink the whole bottle himself when he got the card from his newest, unknown, charge.

It was pretty unreal, and the pregnancy took a while to really set in. As far as symptoms, I had cramps at the beginning that were quite annoying. The next few weeks, I became mildly nauseous for most of most days. I never actually got sick, but I just didn't really want to eat or cook much. So I’ve actually lost about 5 pounds in the first trimester.

I had my official blood test on June 29, but didn't get the results until a week into July.

I had my first appointment with an OB doctor on July 24. Brian didn’t leave work in time and we arrived at the appointment late. This was actually a pre-appointment where they asked Brian and I lots of medical history questions, and gave us lots of information and free samples of pre-natal vitamins. And took a lot of my blood. Turns out I’m A-positive.

I ran late to our next appointment Aug. 4 (a student coming for an advanced math test I was giving came the wrong day and I had to sort out his appointment). I’m afraid we will never be on time. This appointment had an internal component, and they also listened for the baby's heartbeat. I had Brian wait outside, but then asked the doc if she would find the heartbeat again so Brian could hear it. It took her a while to find it, and Brian’s face looked really surprised when he heard the 160+ beats per minute. Her heart monitor was running low on batteries, so she went out to get another one, and returned with an old ultrasound machine, and gave us an impromptu, unofficial ultrasound. Since we weren’t expecting this, it was especially awesome. It was really shocking to see the baby moving around in there. I’ve never thought you could really see that much in ultrasounds, but I could see the features fairly clearly of our little one. It was quite active, and kept bouncing around, gaining the nickname from me “baby jumper”. It finally made this whole thing real.

Now we just need to decide when we are going to share this news with our family and friends.