a spoonful of sugar

with both pregnancies, i didn't have "weird" cravings of the pickle and ice cream variety. but i have had strong cravings. with alexander, it was meat, meat, and more meat. with baby girl, it has been carbs, veggies, and sweets, sweets, sweets.

about a week before we left for california, i emailed a dear friend of mine, whom i met back in college about 13 years ago (suddenly feeling very old). she used to make this amazing banana cream pie which would just lift my spirits. we had made plans to have dinner together during our california trip and i requested she make banana cream pie. the added bonus of being pregnant is you can kind of make outrageous demands, and people, no matter how busy, will bend over backwards to accommodate, especially a close friend who loves you.

back in college, dianne and i use to stay up until three a.m. making this pie, so i knew it was a big ask. but being the amazingly generous and crazy friend she is, she happily agreed to make it for me. the only problem was, she also prepared a 10 course meal of meat, pasta, salad, seafood, and appetizers with enough food to feed at least 15 people, when in reality, only 6 adults would be partaking. i know i have a reputation for exaggerating, but seriously, you can even ask david - it was that much food. and a pregnant lady cannot be trusted not to gorge herself with the feast spread before her, so i ate and ate and ate. by the time the banana cream pie came out, my stomach was literally in my throat. i forced myself to eat the medium slice served to me, though i couldn't adequately appreciate its decadence. and yet i simultaneously wanted a bigger slice.

the next day, and every day since, i have craved that banana cream pie. sigh. and when you're pregnant, you desperately just want people to cook the things you want to eat for you. but alas, dianne is 3000 miles away, otherwise, i know she would have showed up at my doorstep with pie in hand (like she use to do in college when times were tough). so yesterday morning, i strapped alexander in the stroller and made my way to the grocery store to stock up on ingredients.

here are a few modifications that i make to the recipe:

1) i tend to find american desserts too sweet for my liking. anywhere the recipe called for sugar, i halved it or used about three-quarters of what the recipe called for. (i do this for any baking recipe: cookies, cakes, pie...)

2) i omitted the chocolate sauce. but not the caramel sauce.

3) back in college, we were of the waste not, want not mind set, so instead of whipping cream to top the pie, we used the extra egg whites and made a meringue topping instead. to this day, that is still my preference, especially since the custard is so rich. once the meringue is set, top the assembled pie and bake on broil for a few minutes, watch the meringue brown in all the right places. let cool and pop the pie back in the fridge so the custard can reset. be mindful while your meringue is baking lest it get a tad burnt like mine did (in my defense, i was tending to a work email)

4) i know you can buy pre made graham cracker crusts these days, but trust me when i say you want to make your own from scratch. also, make your own graham cracker crumbs - it's more deliciously authentic. something is just off about the pre-crumbed graham crackers that makes me suspicious. back in college, when dianne and i lacked a well equipped kitchen, we would put four graham crackers in large ziplock bags, grab coffee mugs, and sit in front of the tv, while we smashed the crackers into crumbs - by far the most laborious part of the pie making. you can't put more than four crackers at a time because it will eventually tear the ziplock and you will lose preciously earned crumbs. but now, 13 years later, i just break the crackers into my food processor and in less than two minutes, i have the requisite three cups of crumbs. note, you will need three packages of graham crackers (i believe there are four to a box). you must add the melted butter and half smashed banana. it makes all the difference. once you make your crust, you will have some left over crust crumbs. DO use a spoon to eat it like cereal. trust me. no judgment here.

5) and finally: skip dinner, or just eat a salad, because there are more than enough calories to fill hungry bellies in this pie!

things accomplished

on this 39th week plus a day of pregnancy, i have tallied recent accomplishments.

1. i have cleared the major hurdle of having a march baby and thus having to share birthday month. despite husband's best efforts to get me to go on a long walk on sunday, thanks to my extreme pelvic aches, which can only be described as feeling like i fractured or sprained my crotch every time i move, i politely declined. of course, whenever husband is eager to go on one of my beloved long walks, there is most certainly a plot behind it. this time, he was hoping to dethrone me from being queen of march. but my rule remains untouched. 

2. i have cleared the hurdle of having an april fool's baby. i am not sure why i was so worried about this, but i just was.  i also am not sure why i count this as an accomplishment, but feeling morbidly obese as i do these days, just indulge me.

3. last night, i packed up husband's snack pack for our trip to the hospital. you know full of healthy things like barbeque flavored chips, salt and vinegar chips, milk chocolate covered peanut butter filled pretzels, Trader Joe O's, and a bag of marshmallows. 

4. by 10:30 a.m. i had fried up bacon, toasted waffles, and scrubbed the stove (see below for proof of cleanliness!)

unfortunately, there remains a list of things to do:

1. put laundry away:

and it looks like i need to make the bed as well.

2. get dressed, do hair, and make up. (picture of me in XL tshirt, with hair a mess and makeup-less face NOT included)

spring is but a tease

this morning, we woke up to this:

which was so disappointing because we had a lovely spring teaser of a weekend. it is almost april after all. here are a few scenes from our weekend:

i found sunday to be quite productive. not only did i help successfully install our car seat, but i also shaved my legs, which at nine months pregnant, is no small feat. oh yes i did because yesterday the one thing i kept worrying about was having stubbly, prickly legs when the entire hospital staff is up in my woo hoo. you know, i've always been good at this priorities thing. 

on your marks, get set...count contractions

according to my doctor, i have hit the huge milestone of thirty-seven weeks. i also apparently "have gained the upper range of normal weight." thanks - that is exactly what a very pregnant lady wants to hear first thing monday morning.

the trouble with hitting the thirty-seven week mark is you are told that at any minute you can go into labor, which means, for me, any twitch, any slight perception of pain is interpreted as a contraction. so last night, as i lay in bed, i began experiencing distinct pain in my abdomen area around two thirty-five a.m. lucky for me, husband was up, cradling his ipad. i poked him, in between (maybe slightly exaggerated) moans of pain. but seriously, i was definitely uncomfortable. after ignoring me for about fifteen to twenty minutes, he turned over and said, "ok, so should i start timing your contractions?" 

well i have no idea what a contraction is supposed to feel like, but i also did not want to actually be in labor and think i was not in labor and miss my opportunity to get that epidural, so i curled into a ball (as much as a fat pregnant lady can curl into a ball), and murmured, "yes please." only i could not really distinguish when the contractions were starting and stopping, which makes timing them a challenge. the reason i could not distinguish start and stop times of my contractions was because as it turns out, i was not experiencing contractions at all. just a bad, painful case of pregnancy induced gas. and now husband has dubbed me "the girl who cried contractions."

but let me tell you, thank goodness it was just gas and not contractions for real. i keep telling baby to stay in there - stay in there at least another two and a half weeks. because there is still a slight chance we may be able to move before he comes. and if baby wants mom to be reasonably sane, he really will take this under advisement. that and coming out sleeping through the night...that could happen right? improbable, but possible???

happy friday and bon weekend mes amis!

thirty one and thirty six

on sunday, i turned thirty-one. and i have a feeling thirty-one is going to be a great year. keeping my fingers crossed for sustained happiness. even though my birthday fell on one of the worst days of the year, spring forward, and i was robbed of an hour of "all about gracie" time, it was lovely, and low key, and peaceful. just what i needed as we are living among packed up boxes.

 

the husband took me out for brunch at ted's bulletin where we each had a homemade poptart. oh. my. gosh. do yourself a favor and go get one. the crust is buttery deliciousness. i highly recommend the brown sugar and cinnamon one. we also got the blueberry cheesecake one, but the brown sugar and cinnamon one is where it is at.

 

i was treated to an hour long walk - this happens about twice a year, when the hubs is willing to go on a walk with me. so i capitalized on it. and i even got to pick our dinner destination too. if only every day could be all about me =)

 

thirty six weeks pregnant and loving (mostly) it! eagerly waiting for my homemade poptart.

how a red punch buggy driver restored my faith in humanity (for now...)

lately, i am doing serious battle with my pregnant psyche. most days, i force myself to get dressed in something that is not elastic. most days, i put make up on, and most days, i curl my hair. mostly i do this to combat the frightful non-curled hair, no make up, elastic rocking image of gracie that greets me and makes me feel like a gross pregnant lady. ahhh third trimester - a rewelcome of exhaustion plus extreme discomfort plus what in my mind is the equivalent of morbid obesity. make way, grace is barreling down the hall. i have now taken to grunting whenever i try to get up off a chair, or roll over in bed.  most days, i do not feel too great about myself. i am tired. i am cranky. and despite my best efforts to not be a crazy pregnant lady, i am losing - terribly. you see our move got pushed back even more. but most of our house is packed up. what remains to be packed, i cannot pack because there's this baby in my belly that prevents me from being able to bend without grimacing (and he lets me know it too, with a few swift, yet powerful kicks that sometimes bring me to my knees, "mom, quit bending over, you're crowding me out here!") someday, when he is older, i am going to remind him of this and inform him that he was merely a renter, and i the owner and i WILL BE collecting overdue rent!!!! so i am overwhelmed.

 

on top of the stress of now being delayed in moving until two weeks before baby is due, everyone i talk to says that if i do not want to go into labor early, i should limit my unpacking. well, sure that sounds great, except i have this INCREDIBLE need to feel settled, which i am fairly certain cannot happen while everything is still in boxes. it is a conundrum. i guess this is when i cash in my friend chips and call all hands on deck!

 

and the whipped cream and cherry on top of it all is lately, i have discovered that people suck. yes all you rush hour washington, dc metro riders, you stink. everyone avoids my eyes when i get on board in the morning, lest anyone feel obligated to relinquish a seat for the nine months pregnant lady. even older generationed men avert their eyes. seriously people, were you raised in caves by rabid wolves??? it's a problem when i give up my seat to a woman who looks more pregnant than i do.

 

but today, on my drive home from the doctor's office, i decided to stop by chik-fil-a for a spicy chicken biscuit sandwich, because sometimes, you just need one of those to get your day started. i pulled into the drive thru, ordered my biscuit and patiently waited to pull up to the pay window. i almost honked at the little red punch buggy in front of me who did not move right away when the car in front of him moved (what can i say, grouchy grace was visiting). but i did not honk and reveal my impatience. he finally pulled up to the window, paid, got his food, and pulled away. now my turn - i could practically taste that chicken biscuit. as i rolled down my window, the lady handed me the food and said, "the car in front of you paid for your meal." and somehow, that small, $2.49 gesture turned my mood around. there are decent people out there who believe in doing kind things for total strangers.

 

so i drove off into the already risen sun, munching away, with one hand holding my biscuit, and the other the steering wheel, when a toyota truck almost rammed me off the road. and the indignity of it all, i could barely honk at him because i did not want to drop my free spicy chicken biscuit. a one-handed steering wheel controlling attempt at an aggressive honk really equates to scaring the nearby ants. maybe. but boy did that biscuit go down good.

 



countdown

as much as i try to resist being the asian person that i am, i cannot deny that i am a numbers person. it probably comes from shopping trips with my mom when jeans were thirty percent off and she would demand an on-the-spot calculation of what the reduced price would be when i was ten years old! it's actually a miracle that i turned out to be the shopaholic that i became, because math quizzes with momma chiang during trips to the mall can be TERRIFYING! but alas, i digress.

i am a numbers person, with mildly obsessive behavior. i have to "program" my calendar - actual and mental - so that i have a constant tally of upcoming events, and goals, a never-ending to-do list running through my head. so the other day, i found myself doing a little countdown of sorts and realizing that there is just way too much coming up on the burgeoning carlson family.

1. we're supposed to move in eighteen days. *fingers crossed* that this actually happens. this is the current state of our apartment.

2. i turn thirty-one in twenty-six days. i gave the husband the one month notification, but something tells me, he is going to let this slip his mind, to which i can only say, i will be much more pregnant and much more irritable at that time. and forgiveness and forebearance will be long long gone =)

i've spared you all a picture of me inspecting my eyes for new crows feet. ahhhh getting older.

3. there's going to be a wedding in thirty-two days!  in thirty-two days, big brother will don a tux and say "i do." whoa! and i will put on a flowy dark purple bridesmaid dress and a green topper and walk down that aisle looking like a proud, over-stuffed eggplant. i have a list of to-dos for this wedding that i am slowly making my way through: schedule husband for a tux rental, help big brother organize his photo list, and put together some wedding decor.

4. and let's not forget! there's a baby due in approximately fifty-five days! saying fifty-five days is actually more calming to me than acknowledging that the baby is due in eight weeks. eight weeks makes me hyperventilate and panic and think, "WHAT WERE HUSBAND AND I THINKING?!?!?WE CAN'T BE PARENTS!! WE'RE NOT READY FOR THIS. I WANT A DO-OVER - GO BACK IN TIME AND UNDO THIS SITUATION!!!!!" but, fifty-five days - fifty-five days, i can handle! (as of right now anyways).

here's how things are looking at day 225 of pregnancy (a.k.a. thirty-two weeks and a day).

my silver tongued prince charming

my husband is so supportive. truly. he has a way with words that uplift me and take my self esteem to new found heights. i had a particularly hard day on friday - between an overwhelming work load and the overwhelming need to nest that drove me to my hands and knees vacuuming and mopping our apartment floor, i just could not handle the pregnancy anymore. this may have had something to do with the fact that i had not showered nor put on any makeup. it was a ghastly sight each time i walked by the mirror, covered in dust, "pregnancy shine" and that extra layer of pregnancy fat, gently surrounding my now rotund face. 

i tried to hold it together. i really did. i finally sat on the couch as evening approached, ready to catch up on downton abbey. but then i heard the key unlocking our front door and as soon as husband came through the door, i burst into tears. husband stared at me, not sure what to say, or what to do, while i tried to utter my suffering, through staggering breaths and intense sobbing. "i'm SO fat!. my face is as round as a basketball." husband, came over, put his hands around my face and replied, "babe, don't be silly. you're pregnant. you're supposed to gain weight. plus your face is not as round as a basketball. it's more like a honeydew."

so on saturday, while at costco, we decided to do a side by side comparison. what do you think? i may never be able to eat the much loathed honeydew every again. alternatively, my face could just be puffed up, along with the rest of me, after that pep talk. hard not get too big for my britches after husband's loving words of reassurance. 

Chester Cheetos is Not Welcome

you know the saying, "love has no limits,"? well, let me tell you, it does. love stops when crumbs in bed may be involved. 

last night, i found myself to be a particularly ravenous pregnant lady - i'm told the midnight munchies are an (un)fortunate symptom of pregnancy that gets progressively worse throughout the pregnancy. at first, i tried to fight it, as i heard momma chiang's voice in my head, "don't eat snacks too late at night." i'm pretty sure pizza at 12:05 a.m. would fall exactly in this category. so as i lamented  my state of starvation, i simultaneously refused to get out of bed for a snack. 

eventually i caved and walked into the kitchen, opening all our cupboards, and at long last, ending up in my beloved pantry, where i spotted a bag of cheetos - remnants from my first trimester snack cravings. as i opened the bag and began to make my way back to the bed, my beloved husband said, "don't you dare come into bed with those. you'll get crumbs everywhere." [sidenote: leaving a trail of crumbs everywhere is also a special pregnancy skill, soon to be added to my esteemed resume.]  and for emphasis, he closed the  door, and i heard him say, "just to be sure, i'm going to lock the door until you are finished eating those cheetos." too starved to argue, i stood outside my closed bedroom door munching away, thinking to myself, this must be fairly close to what outer darkness and the weeping and gnashing of teeth will feel like - banished, with all cheetos enjoyment taken away. 

baby, thy name is sugar!

lately, scenes around the house include me staring down a bag of chocolate blizzard cookies from trader joe's, telling myself, "i will not have another, i will not have another." baby says, "yes you will." and so the dance goes on, day after day, usually ending with me caving, and sitting on the couch with chocolate crumbs on  my chin. (note to self, must stock up on more cookies. supplies are dangerously low!) our little guy sure loves himself some sugar; that means he's going to be real sweet right?? i was pretty paranoid that i would not pass my glucose test given all the additional sugar my body now needs. yes, i said, NEEDS. but since mom and babe passed the glucose test with flying colors the other day, we treated ourselves. and it was divine. and let me tell you, you have not had caramel corn until you have had garrett's gingerbread crisp over the holidays! happy weekend!

 

awesome parenting

around these parts, we have been practicing parenting and apparently, it's second nature to us, as we have awesome parenting skills.

each week of this pregnancy, husband and i read the weekly development of our baby in "what to expect when you're expecting." a little excerpt from week 22: "Though it is dark in the uterine cocoon - and even with fused eyelids - fetuses this age can perceive light and dark. If you shine a flashlight over your belly, you might feel your baby react..."

so what do we do? of course we shine a bright flash light! and no baby carlson did not react, so then we had to poke him until he woke up. yes. the husband and i definitely have this parenting thing down.

oh and yes, that's a boot on my left foot, because in classic gracie fashion, i sprained my foot - just going about my business, walking on the sidewalk. i'm talented like that.

my latest handy work

last week, i exchanged these texts with husband:

gracie: "Babe, don't yell at me. I scratched the car, pulling into our parking spot."

davey: "Seriously? how bad? and what does 'scratch' mean? Does it include dents?" (my husband the untrusting lawyer)

so far, it would seem that pregnant gracie does not have a good driving record. but in the grand scheme of things, at least i didn't wreck this one. and i guess it's a good thing we didn't end up getting the mercedes that hubby really wanted. something tells me if i had scratched up that baby, there would have been yelling, and much less forebearance.

p.s. here's me and baby at nineteen weeks

how the mighty have fallen...

...so in love! so in love with this little baby! oh yeah people, you read that right! there's a baby cooking in there and things around casa carlson are about to get CRAZY! (or CRAZIER to be truthful and accurate).

there was a time, not so long ago when i simply did not want a baby. i wanted to be free, without limits, without a poopy, whiny, needy, utterly dependent human being, who had me at his or her every beck and call. no thank you! give me freedom, glorious freedom! freedom to travel the world with my love. freedom to come and go as i please. freedom to sleep in. freedom to get in the car without thirty plus travel accessories for a baby. freedom to go shoe shopping. freedom to come home from work, ignore my starving husband, and sit on the couch watching reality tv. real housewives and kettlecorn for dinner. does life get any better than this? and so years before husband and i got married, i flat out told him, i do not want children. i do not want limitation. and i do not want to share you (with anyone cuter than me!)

but then it hit, like a monster truck. i needed a child. in fact, genesis 30:1 may have been quoted to the husband after months of "not preventing" - when rachel said to jacob: "give me child or else i die!" and the need just got more and more desperate as each month progressed with a mostly regular visit from an unwanted visitor. and then we shifted gears from "not preventing" to "trying." let me tell you, the only thing less sexy than telling your husband he's a duck-billed platypus mid make out session, is bounding into the bedroom from the bathroom, positive ovulation test in hand, announcing, "babe, i'm ovulating. get naked." oh the brutal, unromantic, unsexy truth about planned baby-making. but still month after month went by, negative pregnancy test after negative pregnancy test (good thing i ordered them in bulk online over a year ago!) and inner creeping accusations of infertility got louder and louder - or maybe that was me imagining momma chiang saying, "i told you to get pregnant earlier, have a baby earlier." and with each passing month, another friend would call or text with her own joyful news of pregnancy. so when, in july, a close friend told me she was pregnant with number two, when they weren't even trying, i completely lost it. it was my all time best elohi elohi moment.  that night, i lay in bed, and wept, as my husband could do nothing except put his arms around me and tell me - lie to me maybe? - that it was ok. and i summoned my remaining energy to whisper to my God, "Lord sometimes, i only want You for what You can give me. so please give me a baby."

but honestly, i had started to stop believing it was possible. i had started to stop believing in a baby  nathan adrien carlson. i had begun to resign myself to many many more months of a stressful sex life with continued negative pregnancy test results. in the process i learned, there are simply things outside of my control. all the best laid plans, all the scientific timing, and still i could not arrange my life into producing something i wanted. and although i could not quite let go of my desire for a baby, i realized, accepted a little bit, that i couldn't be in control of everything. i couldn't prevent every kind of trial and suffering. somethings just don't come so easily. sometimes, it is just hard. hard to go through and hard to accept.

and then five days later, i pulled my sad, pathetic, self-pitying body out of bed to face yet another day, when in the midst of brushing my teeth, i felt a sudden urge to vomit. and immediately genesis 30:22 came to me: "Then God remembered Rachel, and He listened to her and opened her womb."

i fumbled through my web supplied pregnancy tests and peed with a new sense of urgency and quite frankly, hall of fame worthy aiming skills, all the while trying to tell myself not to be disappointed. i had done this before, been here before. and when for five seconds there was no second line, oh the expected disappointment hit. alas another month. but then, that magical second line appeared and i couldn't believe it. i cried, this time, different tears. because finally, God remembered gracie.

if you look closely, you'll see, baby BOY carlson is due April 8, 2013!

confucius say wha??

husband and i have been talking, for some time now, about "settling down", going back and forth between buying a house or staying put in our 1 BR condo starter home. momma chiang, first introduced here, has been an active participant in these discussions. i can't and won't go into the details of how this all came about mainly because it's only 9:40 a.m. and i'm pretty sure it's still frowned upon to consume alcohol at this time of day. and i honestly can't talk about it without some liquid courage/ frazzled nerves soother.

last night momma chiang called at 8:12 pm to discuss a house we had recently checked out. i don't want to bore you with the details so i'll just give you the highlights. around minute 42 of our phone call momma chiang asked, "what does the property look like?" no, not the house, the actual land. she said, "I need to know what the land looks like. Is it wide in the front and tapers into a more narrow back, like a reverse triangle? or is it narrow in the front and then widens as you go back?" for all you realtors out there, have you ever gotten such a question? momma offered an explanation. and here, i am going to try my best to give you a word-for-word replay. "you want to know why i ask? i'll tell you. because in chinese culture, and this is true 100% of the time, if you have a wide front yard and then a narrow back yard, that means you can't manage money and all the money you have coming in, there's no depth, so you can't hold on to it. you'll always be poor. but if you have a narrower front yard and a wider back property that means you can amass your wealth." so now i've finally cracked the code on the cause of all our financial woes. it can all be traced back to the fact that we just don't have a wide enough back yard. if only we had lived in a place that had a narrow front yard and a wide back yard, david and i could have avoided all our law school and credit card debt. NOW she tells us. clearly she has been holding out on us, never before telling us of this undeniable truth. did i mention that my mother has a masters in engineering? yes folks, she is intellectually brilliant, so you can see how the logic she just presented was flawless. when it comes down to it, can you even argue with such impenetrable logic [read INSANITY]??

during the course of the conversation, whenever we tried to bring up the fact that we cannot/do not want to be encumbered with a sizable mortgage, momma chiang responded with: "david, gracie, you have to do the math and tighten your belly. you don't have to starve yourselves, but you must tighten your belly." it's things like this that make me smile. it reminds me of the days when momma would take big brother and i sneaker shopping - back in the day when we insisted on reeboks, and she kindly suggested la gear, you know, the french sneakers, not the california ones. =) these are the wonderful joys of growing up in a not entirely english speaking household.

the last golden nugget of our phone call  came after the hubs suggested looking for a cheaper house farther out from the district (my soul life died a little after he uttered those words). my mom quickly said that of course that was an option, but then started listing research and statistics about how long commutes are bad for your health. here's the kicker, again, i'm making an effort to give you a word-for-word replay, "david, i'm ok with this as long as it is a good school district. but long commutes to work are bad for your health. so you have to consider, if gracie is the one who will be carrying a baby during pregnancy, it may be hard for her to have a long commute." can someone explain to me an alternate scenario? ladies and gentlemen, my mother, the (mad) scientist.

i'd like to conclude by saying: asian parents, when they are not being crazy (it's rare, but it happens), can be pretty awesome. they view it as their duty to help their children - even their fully able, productive adult children. (of course in asian culture, i'm not entirely sure you're allowed to have or acknowledge children who aren't successful and productive). so truth be told, the hubs and i are really grateful for momma's offer. she's crazy, but she's a keeper.