These Days...

I am finally emerging from the fog that is the first trimester. Good thing, seeings as in just 3 short weeks I'll be headed here



To do lots of this


And this


But unfortunately, none of this…

We booked a trip to Cabo with a group of friends several months ago, before the prospect of a bambino was even on our minds. The only downside to my current "situation" is since this is an all-inclusive resort, the rest of the group will have to drink my share of margaritas since I won't be able to get my money's worth!

Since I've been feeling much better this past week, I decided to drag my lazy butt off the couch and hit the gym last night. My daily work out routine crashed to a halt the minute that extra line showed up. Actually, it was really a few weeks after that when the never ending nausea hit. So, I skipped on over to the gym and was very proud of the 40 min cardio session that I completed. I left the gym sweaty and accomplished, planning on reinstating my gym routine…and then it hit me. I was going to throw up and I needed to get to a bathroom stat. So, there I was, throwing up in the locker room toilet during prime workout hours, with people in the stalls on either side of me. They probably just thought I was some poor, outta shape lady whose first gym session sent her crawling to the toilet. Just when I thought I was over all this nonsense…oh well. I'm going to attempt this again tonight, so finger's crossed history doesn't repeat itself.

Things I've Learned...

As promised, an update! Here's a short list of just of few of the things I've come to learn in these 3 short months of pregnancy...

•Believe your doctor when he tells you that you should be careful when taking antibiotics and your birth control pill…I'll leave it at that

•Morning sickness lasts all day…that's really nothing new. I'd heard that from many people, but I didn't quite understand the weight of those words until I experienced it myself. I felt sick from the moment I opened my eyes in the morning until the moment I closed them at night. It has not been pleasant...

•It's very common to actually lose weight during your first trimester…see above reasoning. I guess Mother Nature decides to throw you the smallest of bones in the midst of all your misery

•You will get very excited when your doctor tells you that you can continue with your daily cup o' joe, until you realize that your unborn child has made you hate coffee. Now, the smell that you once loved waking up to makes you want to run to the toilet. In fact, early pregnancy makes you hate pretty much all the things that you once loved, like Mexican food, which is truly a tragedy

•Top Ramen ranks high on the list of the absolute worst foods to throw up. I had a noodle stuck in my throat for what seemed liked days

•Even the simple act of brushing your teeth can trigger a puke attack. My mornings typically go like this: Wake up. Brush teeth. Gag from said teeth brushing. Barf or dry heave for about 10 min. Repeat. Plan on going through a lot of toothpaste.

•Thinking about starting a family? Take a nice satisfying poop, 'cause it will be the last one for a while!

•Your first ultrasound isn't anything like the movies. That cute little wand doesn't go on your belly. This will traumatized your poor, unsuspecting husband for a short while

•Of all the mumbo jumbo people tell you you can't do while pregnant, the one thing that is actually legitimate is that you can't scoop up cat litter. I can have caffeine, wine, sleeping pills (helps w/ the nausea), and some varieties of sushi, but I can't clean up the cat poop…a small victory! (Oh, and I may or may not have paid my Doctor Father in Law to share that bit of information with my husband)

Despite all the misery that goes along with the early stages of incubating a child, we are very excited about this little thing. All the sickness just reassures us that everything is moving along nicely in there. Last week, the doc wasn't able to pick up a heart beat b/c of where the baby was positioned, so I got a little bonus ultrasound. I got confirmation that this child is certainly John's. It was spazzing out and wiggling like crazy in there, shaking its little arms and legs. It was so crazy to see it moving around so much, while not being able to feel a thing from the outside. In two weeks, we get a chance to find out the gender, if it cooperates, so finger's crossed!!

In Other News

Jeez! It's already August, and in my book that means it's the end of summer. Now's when I start getting excited for cold weather, fall feasts, pumpkins, pumpkin spiced lattes and peppermint hot chocs, Christmas, rain, etc...takes a little bit of imagination when it's 100+ degrees out, but I manage.

Some crazy stuff has happened over the summer. Mainly, we discovered that we'll be adding another Hall to the mix. Our little surprise is scheduled to arrive the beginning of March, just in time for St Paddy's Day. Something tells me this may alter our annual all-day drinking fest, but maybe only for one of us!

Junior has been brewing for about 12 weeks, and let me tell you, he/she is already showing me who's boss. I haven't exactly been the happy go lucky pregnant lady, that's for sure. When I can drag myself off the couch, it's usually to go stick my head in a toilet. I'm slowly starting to have better days mixed in with my not so good days, and I'm hoping that I'll be back to my happy go lucky, food lovin' self in a few more weeks. On that note, I suppose the one plus to all this nausea and food aversion is that the numbers on the scale are going down instead of up...but I know that will be short lived.

For now, I leave you with our first glimpse into my uterus:


I was very early in this pic-just under 7 weeks, so it hardly looks like anything at all. One annoying thing that I noticed after it was over was that the U/S Tech listed my name as Hall, Ruth. Hmmmm....Oh well!

I'll keep this little blog updated much more frequently now that I have something to write about...

Happenings

Things have been busy over in the Hall household. Spring is almost over and summer is fast approaching! Here’s what we've been up to over the last several weeks:

-St Paddy's Day: we celebrated in style, as usual. Our annual tradition of taking the entire day off to really "celebrate" was slightly different this year. We finally got smarter and decided to only take 1/2 of St. P's day off, and then the whole day after. We made our way to the bar just after noon. There was quite a group of us this year (our wise idea of taking the day off has started to spread). Even my FIL joined the fun, and later, my dad made an appearance. It was definitely a fun day! Now the countdown to next year's festivities begins again…





-Mountain Bike Riding: you may remember my last attempt at mountain bike riding. Well, once I was all healed up, we decided to try it again, this time sans clip in shoes. We met some friends at the Fullerton Loop and set off on our 12 mile bike ride. It was soo much fun, and we all escaped without major injury. I can't wait to go back.

-Weddings, Weddings, Weddings: although this year can't possibly compete with last year in terms of how many weddings and wedding related events we went to, wedding season 2011 has definitely begun. My dear friend Ashlee is getting hitched in July, so we have been showering and in two weeks, I will be laying on a lounge chair in Palm Springs for her bachelorette weekend. It can't get here soon enough. While on the subject of weddings, how can I not mention the Royal Wedding Party that we hosted in honor off the new Mr and Mrs?! My mom did a fab job of preparing all sorts of traditional British goodies. We munched on scones, empire biscuits (thank you grandma!), tea sandwiches, sausage rolls, and much more. Oh, and we enjoyed a cocktail or two as well. Loved everything about the royal wedding-especially the hats. And thanks to Miss Ashlee, we sported our own lovely hats.

-Pet News: it's always something with our pets. Over the last few weeks, one of our cats managed to tear all of the paw pads on his rear legs, catch his tail on fire, and eat copious amounts of Easter grass…clearly we aren't ready to be parents just yet! Our other cat managed to gain the attention of the neighborhood ally cat, who likes to scale our balcony and taunt our cat in the middle of the night. The latest trend is that this ally cat, who I've named Thomas, now comes and marks his territory on our balcony by spraying piss everywhere. I love animals, but I can only take so much!
This pic really has nothing to do with anything I mentioned, but in addition to all of our other pet expenses, I think we are going to have a diabetic cat on our hands...Ringo now tips the scale at 21 lbs. He is on diet food, but I think he secretly breaks into our pantry and binge eats at night. It's really the only explanation I can come up with...

-Coming Up: we have a quieter summer than years past. No big trips planned, but we are both looking forward to the upcoming bachelor/bachelorette weekends for Ash and Joe. John and his lil brother David will be skipping out to Boston for a boys weekend. I find that I am simultaneously bitter that I won't be going, and relieved that I won't have to deal with the antics that are sure to transpire when those two are set loose in beantown for the weekend. We are also planning a friend-cation with our awesome pals. We will be going to Cabo for a few days in Sep and I can.not.wait! It's been 3 years since our last real vacation with friends, and that is too long! We also have our big 1 year anniversary in July. I can't believe how fast it's gone. It really feels like we were just bbq'ing and celebrating with all my Scottish family, counting down to the big day. We haven't decided how we are going to spend our anniversary weekend yet, but whatever we come up with will be something worth looking forward to. Also, John will finally get to dig into the cake top that has been in our freezer since last July. There have been many nights where he's come home after a "long" night, and wanted to devour it, so in just a few short months he can finally enjoy it.

Well, that about does it for now. I'll try to update more regularly from here on out ; )

The Story of Us

It's the title of my blog, but I don't think I've ever told the entire story of how we came to be… It all started nearly 8 years ago. I was 19, and my sophomore year of college was coming to an end. There was a lot of impending excitement-the old TGIO fraternity parties, summer break with nothing to do but lounge by the pool with my roomies, bonfires at the beach, d-land trips, country concerts, oh and occasionally tutor at Sylvan a few hours a week-I was livin' the easy life! But first, I had to get through finals week. My two bestest friends and I all lived together. Brooke and I were attempting to cram for finals in our apartment. Megan had already taken her last final, and was a free woman. So obviously, she decided to try and "entertain" us while we were studying. When B and I decided that we just weren't able to concentrate at our apartment, we headed to the TSU (Titan Student Union) to study. This proved to not be an original idea. The entire Greek system seemed to be there "studying" as well. Needless to say, we didn't get much accomplished. I didn't expect to see anyone important, so I was wearing my sorority letters and pj bottoms. I was quizzing myself for a history final using notecards that I had made. Megan was entertaining herself by drawing inappropriate doodles on my notecards and in my textbooks. I'm sure whoever bought that book after me was pretty amused. I was chatting with some friends I knew in between my quizzing sessions when all of a sudden this guy walks in the TSU and over to our table. He was wearing a skin tight wifebeater-type tanktop and gym shorts, and was carrying an 80's style boom box on his shoulder. He announced that he was rehearsing for his Dance 101 final (it was a boy-band dance routine that he offered to show us). Apparently this was John Hall. I had heard about him before. He was Brett's (my roommate Megan's bf now husband) big bro in fraternity. I had also heard that he was insane. I was introduced to him. He asked what I was studying for. I told him it was a history final. He then explained that he knew EVERYTHING there is to know about history and offered to quiz me. I passed. A few weeks went by and I didn't think anything of that guy I met in the TSU. I had a boyfriend. He later told me that he thought I seemed stuck up. Sparks definitely didn’t fly. Early in the summer, I found myself single for the first time since I was 14. I had the same bf all through highschool and the first two years of college. I thought that I needed to be single and experience life on my own for a while, since I had always had a boyfriend. I was a little down and feeling bad about how everything w/ my bf ended so my roommates thought it would be fun to take me out country line dancing at the Crazy Horse in Irvine. There ended up being a big group of fraternity guys that we knew at the Crazy Horse. Apparently Wed nights were college nights. I walked in and before I could even put my purse down, J came up to me and asked if I wanted to "two-step". I agreed and we chatted and danced for a song or two. Later that night, John asked Brett if he could get my phone number. Brett gave it to him, but told him that I had just broken up with a long term bf and probably wouldn’t be interested in anything serious. Over the next few weeks, we would have people over to our apartment, and Megan would invite John, or Brett would suggest we see what John was up to…they were matchmaking right under my nose. We got to know each other over the next several weeks. We would have people over, and John would show up and we would sit on the couch and just talk, sometimes all night. Really-we were just talking…and I learned that this crazy guy with a tongue ring and leopard spotted hair was actually really great. He def had his crazy moments, but we both had a lot in common. We grew up in similar households. He was very close with his fam, and adored his little brothers. Our first few dates actually included babysitting his little bros. He loved cats (and has since let me fill our house with them), and he could recite almost every line to Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet (just like me!). He also had the Moulin Rouge soundtrack in his car, and we would sing the duet on every drive together. One day, after a bad fight with my parents, he commanded that I get into his car. I had been crying, and was a hot mess. He drove silently to a park in Fullerton. He told me to walk with him along the grass and to leave my phone and shoes in the car. After a couple of minutes of wondering what the heck we were doing there, the sprinklers came on. He told me to run like I did when I was a little kid playing in the sprinklers. It was like a movie. That sealed it for me-I had fallen! Later that summer, he invited me to meet his family at a mini-reunion at Paradise Point San Diego. He asked me to be his girlfriend there. 6 years later, he asked me to be his wife there. A year after that, we got married there. I joke with him now that I married my rebound guy. I thought I wanted to be single and the first guy I dated I ended up marrying. Funny how life works that way. Here's a look at us over the years…

Clutter

I was rummaging through my closet a few weeks ago when it dawned on my how much crap I have. Every last bit of drawer space, hanging space, and storage space is filled, perhaps overflowing. I started going through my stuff and soon found myself on a trip down memory lane. I save everything. I mean everything. It's not so bad now, but when I was younger, every little note passed, memento, ticket stub, etc held some sort of significance to me, so I kept them. First in a little tin box from Sanrio (I was 12, ok?!), then I upgraded to a shoe box, and finally to a large plastic crate which rests in the top shelf of my closet. I read some notes that my BFF Lauren and I passed throughout Jr High and High School and man, first of all, we were dorks, and second of all, I can hardly decipher the code of abbreviations, nick-names given to classmates that I have long forgotten, and inside jokes that riddle the pages of these notes. It's like reading gibberish written by a stranger. This brings something to mind...note passing is probably a thing of the past. Almost every elementary, jr high, and certainly high school kid has a cell phone, and texting is surely the new note passing. But, you can include illustrations in texts, and boy did we like to illustrate all over our notes!
I also found ticket stubs to Austin Powers that we saw in New Jersey, plane ticket stubs and subway ticket stubs from our trip to NY and DC after 8th grade graduation, a brochure for Gaylord Lighthouse Tours from a Martha's Vineyard trip when I was 13 (we couldn't get over the Gaylord part). I kept virtually every plane ticket stub and subway/train/bus/museum ticket for every trip I had ever been on (which is a lot!), and even my old retainer-ew!. I kept every card, love note, print out of IM chats, movie ticket stub, plane ticket stub, graduation flyer, prom invitations, (and even my corsage from my 1st prom) from my first (and only) high school boyfriend.
More digging discovered zebra-printed keys (anyone else get designs printed on their house keys?) and a lease contract for my first apartment. In case you were wondering, Megan and Brooke, our move-in date for "Scamdon" was 12/14/2002.
I have another tub full of all my sorority things. Greek week costumes, about a dozen different letters, John's pin that he gave me during a pinning ceremony his last year in college, and a bunch of pictures that never made it to albums due to their content...hehehe
I have a bunch of notes from John from back in college (again, pre-texting) that include several racy comics that he would draw when he was bored in class. I should scan one and post it one of these days-they are quite entertaining!
My goal was to get rid of the "crap" in my closet to make more room. After a couple of hours of sifting, my toss pile contained a few coins and some gum wrappers that had accidentally made it into my tubs, and a giant keep pile that contained everything I started with. I just couldn't part with any of it. The fact that I had saved it all for all these years makes it even harder to part with it all. I think I tend to form attachments to inanimate objects. When I was a younger, I could never get rid of my stuffed animals, even when I outgrew them, because I didn't want to hurt their feelings or make them sad. As ridiculous as it sounds, I am the exact same way today.
So, after my trip down memory lane came to an end, I carefully packed it all back up and put it back on my top shelf. Maybe next time I "clean out" my closet, I'll start with the clothes and shoes. In the meantime, I suppose I'll just continue to be a crazy hoarder!

Updates

Well, there has not been much to blog about these days...life has been busy, but not overly exciting-which is exactly what I needed. We have passed the time by buying mountain bikes and getting prepared for our new hobby-which was quickly cut short by this clumsy gal injuring herself on her first ride (may or may not have happened right in front of my house within 5 minutes of getting on the bike-damn clip in shoes!!), and I suffered from a broken elbow and a fractured ego. Since then, I have learned to love the stationary bikes at the gym-I can read a good book, which I never have time to do, and I can burn calories at the same time. Plus, I have yet to fall off it. Win-Win. We've tried out some delish new restaurants in our area, caught up with good friends, done some home imrovements, and finally spent the last of our wedding gift cards.

Last week, though, there was some fun to be had. My company took its sales team to Cabo for the weekend as a reward for exceeding its agressive sales sales goal in 2010. It was a perfect 4 day getaway and the resort was awesome-I'd highly recommend it (and I'm a snob when it comes to these things). My only complaint is that the food wasn't great...not bad, but not delicious either. But, it was about standard for an all-inclusive. Here are some pics from our weekend.

View of one of the pools at our resort



Infinity pool overlooking the ocean

J and I

Mamacita and I

Arrrrr...on a pirate ship

I saw a whale breach about 100 feet away...pretty incredible

I was the *lucky* audience member who got terrorized a rogue pirate during their show...and in case you are wondering-that is a real sword with a real blade, and he was really pushing it against my neck. Oh, Mexico


But, clearly I survived

Fun stuff!