Some random thoughts

• I love watching Teresa play with her baby doll. You'll never convince me that gender roles aren't inherent. She's so tender and caring with her. She'll pat her back after diaper changes, and cradle her in her arms to share her milk with her. Every once in a while she'll stop pushing her stroller just to bend down and give her baby a kiss.

• We finally got our new furniture! Apparently when the store said 2-4 weeks until delivery they really meant 2-4 months, and when they said they'd be here between 9 and 1, they really meant sometime after 1. But, it's finally here, and we love it. It's sooooo much more comfortable than our old Craigslist stuff. Here's a picture of it right after delivery. We'll probably move them around a bit, but our plans for getting rid of our old stuff fell through, so we're a little crowded right now. I made some pillow covers to add some color, but the little one got chocolate on them, so they were in the wash.
  

• I've had the privilege of being sick for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's this year. Fun stuff. Here's where I make a plug for Breathe Right Nasal Strips. It's time you all knew about them too. They're pretty much the most amazing things ever invented. We first bought them waaayyy back when we first got married, because Marc had a little snoring problem. They didn't work for that at all, but a few months later when I was sick and stuffed up I decided to give them a try. Seriously, they're the best ever. I use the regular ones a lot when I'm pregnant, because I have trouble breathing at night occasionally, and this last round of being sick I used the Advanced strips, and they are pretty intense. There's seriously no way you can wear one of those and not be able to breathe. Next time you're sick or stuffed up, you should try some. (T's first order of business in the morning is to pull them off for me. Which I don't mind with the regular ones, but the advanced ones can be a little painful if you're not ready for someone to rip them off your tender nose/under eye skin).
  

• Marc and I celebrated our third wedding anniversary this last week. It was the first time we've been able to do so without someone throwing up. Marc was blessed with the stomach flu on our honeymoon, I was pregnant and sick the first anniversary, and last year we were both lucky enough to have the stomach flu for our anniversary. We were both feeling pretty good the morning of the 29th this year, so I was sure it would be Tressa throwing up this time. Luckily, we all made it through the day vomit free. Which is more than I can say for the 30th, unfortunately. We celebrated by eating some especially delicious Italian food, since we missed out on the stuff we had at our reception.

• I'm bummed about the lack of snow here. I know I spent all my winters in Utah complaining about the snow, but I was finally excited for it this year! It feels weird for it to be as cold as it is outside without snow on the ground.
  

• I'm excited for it to be 2011 already! That means only a little over a month until our new little girl gets here. This pregnancy has been about a thousand times less miserable than Tressa's, but I'm still ready to be done. When I was pregnant with T, I was totally terrified of labor. I pretty much thought it would be the worst thing that would ever happen to me. (It wasn't). My one solace was the idea that after doing it the first time I wouldn't have to be so worried about any subsequent babies we might have. I was wrong. I'm totally freaked out about giving birth again. Even more so this time, I think, because of how fast T was born. I'm really paranoid that I'll go into labor and not make it to the hospital in time to get an epidural.

• T has started doing more and more pretend play, and I love it. She pretends to be a kitty a lot recently. She'll come in our bedroom in the morning doing nothing but meowing. It's super cute. I can't believe how big she is already. She turned 19 months on our anniversary. I took her in for her 18 month check up last week, and she's 34 1/2 inches tall (in case you don't remember, she was 30 inches at 12 months, so that means she's put on 4 and a half inches in 7 months!) and weighs 28 lbs. She thinks she a big girl, too. We were at church one week and she was pointing out all the babies to me. She pointed to a little girl a few months older than herself and said 'baby'. So I asked if Teresa was a baby and she shook her head and said 'No!' very adamantly.