Name dilemmas

So, many of you know that we've been looking to find a baby boy's name in case Baby Pistachio announces that he's a he on August 10th. Thanks to all of you who have voted on our name list over the last several months. We've now made our 3rd revision to the list, however have come upon a dilemma...neither Jason or I agree on our top choices. Thanks to a baptism and a mini-family reunion that we went to yesterday, the name Connor and Miles were added to the list. However, Miles didn't make our top picks as we both liked the name but couldn't say that we liked it more than the other names we already had on the list. Jason has now gravitated to the name Connor (a name my uncle threw out there this morning...good job, Uncle Frank! Much better than Obediah!). Jason has officially decided to cut the name Shamus as he's pretty convinced that I will never get on board with the name. I've officially convinced him that if we go with the traditional spelling of Seamus, our kid will constantly deal with hearing about semen and on a website we found this morning, our modified spelling of Shamus reminded parents that the name can easily be changed to Shamu in reference to the big, fat whale at Sea World. Of course now, I'm going through a guilt trip as Jason's been pushing for the name Shamus ever since we discovered we were pregnant. With that all said, here's our latest and most revised version of our baby boy name list. Please feel free to provide us with comments on these names as we are stuck!!

Name	Origin	Meaning	Jason	Amy
Chase	English	The hunter		*
Cole	English	Dark and swarthy		*
Collin	Irish Gaelic	Fire	*
Eli	Hebrew	The highest		*
Owen	Welsh	Well-born (form of John)		*
Connor	Gaelic	Lover of hounds, hound noblemen	*
Silas	Latin	Of the forest	*

Getting the Nursery Ready - Part Deux

I know you've all been waiting for the exciting sequel to "Getting the Nursery Ready - Part 1", so here it is!  Over the past few weeks we've been figuring out how to decorate the rest of the baby room.  With the painting done all we had to do was put up pictures, shelves and some adhesive dots that we had to decorate the corners of the room.  Now when I say "we" I really mean "me" as my pregnant cohort was promoted to "supervisor-in-chief" about 24 weeks ago.  Thankfully she was able to direct me well and we ended up with a pretty nice looking baby room (if I do say so myself).  We have adhesive dots in all the corners as you'll see in the pictures, but we're not quite finished there yet.  We have a sheet of blue and a sheet of pink dots that we'll be putting up after the baby is born and we know the gender for sure.  We'll also be putting up a few more pictures and things as the weeks go by, but these pictures will give you a good taste of what the finished product will look like.

Now, the grand finale "Getting the Nursery Ready - The Final Frontier" will be here in just a few short weeks.  We're actually heading out in a few hours to get the first of several cumbersome pieces of furniture that we (I) will have to be putting together.  So stay tuned for smash hit of the summer!

Apology Letter to Pistachio

Dear Pistachio,
This is to apologize for the recent drama and stress that you might have felt or heard over the last 3 weeks. In the last 1 1/2 years that I have worked at my job, I have not experienced as much emotional stress and difficulty as I have these last 3 weeks. The teenagers I see are really struggling. They are angry, out of control, and want to blame everyone except for themselves...which includes me and every other person that tries to help them. I know you can hear now, at least that's what babycenter.com says, but I'm hoping you can't hear well enough to hear the language that has been used by my kids. I'm so glad that you are tucked away in your safe little bubble under the skin and can't see all that I've seen over the last few weeks. These kids don't mean you or me any harm, but they definitely have caused me a lot of emotional stress over these few weeks. I asked the doctor at our 23 week checkup if this stress was negatively affecting you. Thankfully, the doctor comforted me and advised me to make sure that I'm not at risk for physical harm. We have a great support team at work, Pistachio. My co-workers are great at protecting me and you and making sure that we're not at risk. I'm hoping that the next few weeks will calm down. I'm hoping we don't witness any more violence, harm any more swearing, or visit with any more police officers, but I can't promise you that. What I can promise you is that daddy and I have a wonderfully relaxing vacation coming up where I can take you to hear the ocean and feel the sunshine. I can promise you that I will keep you safe and will remove you from any physical harm. I can promise you that I will rub you and talk to you calmly as soon as we get out of work, on our drive home. I can promise you that daddy will be here for us as soon as we come home. And I can promise you that I will continue to love you and take care of you to the best of my ability. So, just hang in there little Pistachio, we're going to make it through this rough patch.

Love,
Mommy

23 Week Doctor Checkup

We just finished up our 23 week doctor checkup and baby Pistachio received another clean bill of health! Baby's heartbeat remains strong, anywhere between 140 and 150 beats a minute. The doctor also informed us that by next week, baby Pistachio is considered to be viable. This means that with significant medical intervention, baby Pistachio could survive outside of the womb if preterm labor occurs. Of course, knock on wood, this doesn't happen and Pistachio has several more months before making his/her announcement into the world. Our next doctor checkup is in 3 weeks, then another checkup in 2 weeks, next ultrasound at 34 weeks, and then weekly doctor checkups at 36 weeks. In 3 weeks, I also go for a sugar test and a rh- vaccine. It's crazy to think how quickly this pregnancy has gone by. To think that I'm already 6 months into the pregnancy and in just a few weeks will be starting the third trimester. We've got a lot to do before this little one enters our lives!

Before Jason went on his guy's weekend camping trip to Utah, we took a few pictures of me at 23 weeks.

          

We're having a girl!!....errrr I mean a boy!!: Baby Gender Prediction Myths

As many of you know, I finally convinced Jason to wait until delivery before finding out baby Pistachio's gender. Many of our close friends and family have talked about the joy in waiting for the big surprise. Despite the fact that we've decided to wait, we figured it would be fun to try out some old wives' tales when it comes to predicting the baby's gender. We also decided we would place a blog poll asking our friends and family their predictions for baby Pistachio's gender. Here are the results of the gender myths we took.

According to these myths, Jason and I are expecting a baby boy:

You are carrying the extra weight out front

Your belly looks like a basketball

Your areolas have darkened considerably

Your hands are very dry

You hang your wedding ring over your belly and it swings left to right

Face narrow

Linea Negra to rib cage

Total: 7

According to these myths, Jason and I are expecting a baby girl:

You had morning sickness early in pregnancy

Your baby's heart rate is at least 140 beats per minute

You are craving sweets

You are craving fruit

You don't look quite as good as normal during pregnancy

You are moodier than usual during pregnancy

Your face breaks out more than usual

You refuse to eat the heel of a loaf of bread (although this isn't any different from my pre-pregnancy state)

Your breasts have really blossomed!

Your urine is a dull yellow color

Add your age at  time of conception and the number for the month you conceived - sum is an odd number

Babycenterpredictor.com reported girl

Pendant swings back and forth

Total: 13

What do you think?