Truckin' Along

To answer the question that seems to be on everyone's lips lately, yes, I'm feeling fine and the heat isn't bothering me too much at all! With temps consistently over 100 degrees, it's good that (a) I'm a Texas girl and actually like the hot weather (gasp!) and (b) I work inside.

Not a lot going on in baby news to update on--nursery is coming together, slowly but surely. Alex and I start our birthing class next Tuesday. We went on a tour of the new labor and delivery wing of the hospital I'll be delivering at, which definitely made everything seem a lot more real. At our last monthly appointment (they'll be about every 2 weeks for the next three, and then every week 'til the end!), Ali was still measuring big--about one week ahead in all measurements!

In non-baby updates, there are quite a few tasks that need to be crossed off the list. They didn't all happen this month, but I thought I'd give you a brief recap of them anyway.

#3: get published as an editor or writer--I've been doing a steady amount of freelance work for a small local company for almost a year now, and actually have my name on the inside cover as the editor. Neat!

#8: motivate husband to create his own version of goal list and time frame--we had a great discussion in Hawaii, and though Alex will never create 101 goals, nor write them down, he was able to articulate his own version of this list and list time frames within which to complete the tasks. Yay for goals!

#18: avoid getting sunburned--this will be an ongoing task for the rest of my life, but I'm proud to say I spent a week in Hawaii without getting burned! Even though the summer is only halfway over, I'm not anticipating another week in the sun (see above reference about working indoors), so I'm going to go ahead and cross this one off.

#19: go to the dentist consistently--after my second 6-month dental check-up, I feel confident in saying that I have found a dentist I love and have gotten back into the 6-month dental visit routine.

#24: no fried food for a month--at the beginning of June, I just decided that it might be a good month for a health challenge, so I gave up all fried food. It wasn't actually all that hard! Good thing I picked a month with only 30 days. :-)

#26: take a mental health day--it hasn't happened yet, but I have decided to take every Monday in August off! This is huge for me, and I am really struggling with feelings of guilt. I keep thinking to myself, I don't really need that time off, that's just being lazy, etc. Then Alex reminded me that not only will I probably be fairly uncomfortable by then, it may very well be the last time for like 25 years I have some "me" time. That helped me feel a lot better about taking those days off!

#34: get a water softener--yay! That was our last item on our original "things to get for the house" list!

#37: have the neighbors over for dinner--we finally had our neighbors over for dinner. Too bad it was only five days before they move back to the Fort Worth area. :-(

#59: tell my family I love them whenever we hang up--I am so proud to say that I have gotten very good about this one! My dad and brother were the hardest to do this with, and maybe it's being pregnant, but I suddenly just don't care as much . . . life is too short not to tell your loved ones that they are loved.

#77: clean out house and donate at least twice a year to Goodwill (5 times total)--PROGRESS. We've not donated 3 loads, and I know after I have the baby I will donate a bunch of pre-pregnancy clothes that simply won't work any more. Almost there!

#86: sew something--ok, so the spirit of this one was to create something crafty with my hands. I didn't sew something per se . . . I knitted something. That's right. Apparently, when I'm pregnant, I knit. I made a little baby hat and am working on a matching body suit. I can't wait to put them on Ali!

Whew! As you can see, lots of progress made! Hope all is well with everyone, and that you are all finding ways to survive the summer heat.

With love,
K.