Fat and Happy

So I've had a request to "show everyone how fat you've gotten". Although my first thought was to knock this person flat onto the ground and give them a severe beating, I quickly came to my senses and thought "Calm down Christina....he is your husband and the father of your future child and who will change light bulbs if he's in the hospital?....breath.....breath". Haha! If anyone it wasn't Jason, he's learned to walk very delicately around the topic of weight lately. So for those of you who haven't seen me lately, or those of you who are stalking me on-line and need to put a face to a name so that when you kidnap me in Target parking lot, you'll be sure to get the right person....here ya go!

Somewhere around 18 or 20 weeks



Doing the typical pregnant stance at 25 weeks. Not sure why all us

pregnant people feel this is the way to pose in pictures, as if my hands really need to outline where the baby is...just incase you weren't sure!

All in all I've been feeling really good. I had a doctor's visit 2 weeks ago that was interesting. Let me paint you a picture. (Warning: being a nurse I've forgotten what tends to be acceptable topics of conversation and what takes things too far, so read at your own risk) So I go to my monthly check up and first thing they do is give you a cup for a urine sample. Now I'm not sure about anyone else, but for me that usually entails having to strip to just my socks as I haven't quite mastered the art of urine sample collection. Let's just say I've learned to keep a spare change of clothes in my purse! (what? Too much info??) So after struggling to get RE-combobulated (that's the opposite of discombobulated) in a 4x4 bathroom in a short amount of time so as not to draw attention to the fact that I'm inept at urine collection, I exit the bathroom breathing heavy and sweating profusely. Next it's on to my favorite part of the exam, the scale! Once again I try and strip to my socks, but they strongly discourage it since the scale is out in the open. So I stick with tossing my shoes and coat to the side. About 4 people came running full speed at the blood curdling scream I released as I saw what my current weight was. Then, since I was nice and calm having realized I weighed roughly the size of a trailer, they took my blood pressure. Genius! Great timing! I'm sure the reading will be normal! Surprise Surprise.... my blood pressure is high!! So I met with the doctor who said with my weight gain, increased blood pressure, and protein that was in my urine I have the pleasure of going back again in 2 weeks so they can monitor me and see if the protein goes away and if my blood pressure goes down. Here's an idea, maybe you should take my blood pressure first before putting me through the emotional roller coaster of peeing in a cup and weighing myself! I go again the day before Thanksgiving and hopefully things have settled down.

So other than that, I've been feeling really great, Sparkle is kicking up a storm, and we're starting to think about nursery colors and how to decorate the room. We're looking forward to eating a huge Thanksgiving dinner at the Farm and seeing how far this maternity skirt can stretch. Hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving! Until next time!

How could they?!!?

Today is a very important day for Americans all across the country. As I awoke to my alarm clock playing stars and stripes and with my American flag firmly gripped in my hand I made my way to my computer with a sense of pride in our country. That is until I saw this headline on MSNBC which caused me to lose all hope in our future: "Twinkies to shrink into 100-calorie snack packs " It goes on "Hostess Twinkies are becoming the latest product remade and repackaged into 100-calorie snack packs, a product some analysts say could do well given that more people are packing their own lunches in the slumping economy. The maker of the golden yellow, creme-filled cake is launching "Twinkie Bites" nationwide in stores on Monday. It's also introducing a snack pack featuring strawberry cupcakes as it extends the 100-calorie pack line originally aimed at women who wanted to snack more sensibly. And while Leavitt notes that the original Twinkie come in at 150 calories, people asked for a lightened version and the company got to work. They didn't want to just shrink the Twinkie, known for its elongated shape, Leavitt said, so they created three, miniature round versions. Leavitt said people enjoy having multiple bites rather than just the one product."

WHAT?!?!? I thought it was election day...not April Fool's day!! Please tell me this is some cruel joke!! I thought we lived in a democracy where all earth-shattering changes were to be voted on by the American people! I didn't vote for this!! Hostess, the maker of Twinkies, has decided that in our slumping economy American's don't want the traditional oblong 150 calorie Twinkie, but instead would rather drown our sorrows in three tiny bite sized "cakes" that total 100 calories! They say they are targeting "women who want to snack more sensibly". Who are these stupid women who are ruining the foundation of our country?? If you want to snack responsibly maybe you should be reaching for a carrot stick and not a pack of twinkies!!!!!! I am a woman who doesn't want to snack responsibly and am sickened that, not only am I being robbed of 50 cream filled calories, but now I have to exercise when I am forced to reach 3 times into a package to eat 3 Twinkie bites?! And did anyone think about how this will work when I'm driving down the road enjoying the goodness known as a Twinkie? Before I could just greedily shove one whole Twinkie into my mouth without ever breaking eye contact from the road or missing a gear as I cruised past multiple gyms on my way to get my McDonald's fix. But now?! Now, I have to attempt to balance a package of 2 more cakes on my lap as I'm "sensibly" shoving the first tiny bite sized cake into my mouth while attempting to shift gears and then having to continually look to down ensure my lap of Twinkies hasn't gotten cream filling all over my clothes or rolled onto the ground and splattered all over my Wendy's take out bag!

The article concludes by saying : "It's not some impostor like some portion control products would be," Leavitt said. "From that standpoint it eats like a Twinkie, it smells like a Twinkie, it tastes like a Twinkie. " Oh really Mr. Leavitt?!?!?! You're probably one of those people who thinks everything tastes like chicken too!! I will know the difference!! As I'm crying and attempting to drown my sorrows in calories...I'LL KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BECAUSE I CAN COUNT!!! THREE IS NOT ONE!!!

What's next?? Ho Hos will become bite sized and just called Hos? Or maybe we should just rename them all together since the name HoHos is quite provocative!!

Goodbye old friend. I need to drown my sorrows....in a carrot stick.

Congratulations Ben and Molly!!

Well it was off to Ohio for the 2nd Watkins' wedding in a month and what a beautiful wedding! Jason, Nancy and I broke the trip up a bit and left Thursday night and drove to Buffalo where we spent the night at the Hilton Garden Inn. After late night (or was it early morning by that time??) McDonald's sundaes and raiding the bathroom of all the little sample size shampoos and lotions it was back on the road and heading toward Strasburg, OH. Once arriving at Strasburg we checked into our hotel and then headed down to help Molly and Ben set up the reception site. That night a bunch of us went and ate at the Amish Door the food was SO good and SO not good for you! "Yes I'll take the fried chicken, roast beef, mashed potatoes, ham, and a coronary blockage please!!" Strasburg has a LARGE amish population and it was so cool to see about 10 horse and buggies tied up outside of the restaurant. At one point I must have become Amish struck and I'd decided I wanted to sell my car and start riding around Albany exclusively in a horse and buggy. Who needs more than one horse power? heated leather seats? air conditioner/heater? a radio? seat belts? air bags? Not me!! At this point Jason decided I must be delusional from low blood sugar and he quickly forced me to drink a large glass of OJ. After reminding me that I forget to water my one plant on a regular basis...how would I remember to feed my "automobile" it's grains every day I recovered from my quick bout of insanity it was back to the wedding!! So for this wedding I took the pictures while telling Jason that I would blow his pictures from last wedding out of the water... hence the ENORMOUS amount of pictures! I decided to save you from scrolling through 28 pages of pictures and put them into a slideshow. Enjoy!!

Water, and Weddings, and Birthdays...OH MY!

WARNING: There are A LOT of pictures in this post. So you can either tough it out, or go surf Wikipedia for more useless knowledge. Just don't say you weren't warned!

I think I start most blogs by saying this but "we have been SO busy lately!". We just got back last Sunday from a whirlwind trip to Ohio for Darren and Rebecca's wedding. Knowing that it would take us 10 hours to drive out there, Jason and I decided to break the trip up a bit and make some stops along the way. Since I'd never seen Niagara Falls before, we decided to leave Thursday night and drive the 5 hours north to the Falls. We arrived around midnight and got a hotel room for the night, and then spent most of Friday walking around the Falls. We went on both the American side and the Canadian side to view the Falls. The fun part (sarcasm) was crossing the border patrol. Since I don't have a current passport I had to bring roughly 400 forms of ID to prove how exactly I've become the person I am today. Starting with birth certificate, moving on to marriage license, going to current driver's license, ending with ultrasound within the past 4 weeks proving that in fact I am pregnant and not trying to smuggle large quantities of heroin in my belly across the border. I think it was harder to get back IN to the US than it was to get out. The questions they ask are a bit ridiculous. "Why were you in Canada? How long were you there for? Where are you going now?" I'm glad Jason was answering because my answers wouldn't have been so friendly. I wanted to say to the macho border patrol guy "really?? Have you looked at our economy lately? Have you paid any attention to how much NY taxes are?? Have you heard illegal immigrants are actually leaving the country because things are so down? Why would we be trying to sneak IN!??!" At this point Jason had to put a pillow over my face and explain to the man that I was pregnant, hungry and had to pee (again!) and should therefore be considered mentally unstable and to disregard all I'd said. Luckily we were allowed back into the country and we continued on our way. Here are some pics of the Falls:

(Kids, don't try this at home. Leave it to the 26 year olds who should know better!!)

Rockin' the sweet yellow panchos! P.S. No, I haven't turned into the hunchback, that's the camera bag that's on my back.

So after our time in Niagara, we headed an hour back down to Freedom where we picked up George and then started the 5-6 hour drive to Ohio. Jason and George started rationing what I was allowed to drink because they quickly got tired of hearing "ummm...guys...I kinda have to pee" every hour on the hour! After seeing some of the finest bathrooms along the route, we made it to Ohio at 11:45pm and crashed after a very long day.

The Wedding Day:

Before leaving for the wedding, Jason, George and the kids went for a quick swim at the hotel. And by "swim" I mean J & G swam around and had to practically drag the kids into the water as they were not as excited about the idea as the older "kids" were.

Tears, tears, and more tears

Now it's off to the wedding!

Whew! What we didn't get was a picture of how red Jason's face got as Dana led people in singing happy birthday to him since it was his birthday!! Anyways, it was a beautiful wedding and a fun weekend full of driving. And now I'm off to meet my OLD husband (26!!!) for a lunch of pureed carrots and Ensure! Until next time!!

Just Beachy!

I have been so busy at work lately I haven't had time to update this ol' thing. Of the past 8 days I've worked 6 of them. I know... for those of you who work 5 days a week every week you think "big lousy deal" but it's slightly different working six 12-hour nights than working 5 days from 9-5 since you're sleeping halfway through your days off. Anyways, thankfully I've survived and now I have Friday and Saturday off to try and catch up on the mounds of house work and to be with Jason! And get this... my manager actually had the nerve to call and ask if I'd work again tonight. I think she realized from the sounds of my hysterical laughing/uncontrollable sobbing into the phone that I wasn't going to be coming in!!


During the first week of this month Jason and I went on vacation!!! We went down to Ocean City, MD. We had so much fun! We met up with my parents and Jeff and Britta. We rented a big house and all just hung out doing NOTHING! It was awesome! I love going to the beach, and almost more than that, I love not having to wear a watch and not caring what time it is because you really don't have anything you need to get done. You can just sit around and be a bum! It was a perfect vacation!




Britta and Jeff have a few more pictures that I want to add, so I'll put them up as soon as they send them. Anyways, better go start cleaning the house! Have a great weekend!

Blogger Tag

So it seems like I've been "tagged"...twice. (thanks Julie and Shelly) Now it's not what you may think. I have not been tracked down by a farmer, held on the ground as I kick and scream, and had a giant yellow tag with a number on it punched through my ear....

I've been blogger tagged...twice. That means I have to write 7 things about myself. I suppose since I was tagged twice I should do fourteen. Now I'll admit to you (and maybe we should just count this as factoid numero uno)...when I read in my comments "you've been tagged". I immediately started to hyperventilate. Spots appeared before my eyes, and as I lay crouched in the fetal position...I began to have flashbacks. Imagine a, while slightly "big boned", young impressionable, 197 lb 12 year old girl standing in her parents back yard minding her own buisness while stealthily polishing off 3 twinkies, a box of ho-hos, and a side of beef, when all of a sudden out of the back door flies her, slightly annoying and completely dorky, younger, waif like brother, (let's call him Jeff). Just as our heroine is struggling to get that stupid yellow bendy straw into the tiny aluminium foil covered hole in the top of a Capri Sun juicebox, she's abruptly slapped on the back. She goes flying face first into the ground, twinkie filling squirting everywhere as she lands on the box and through her astonishment she hears "TAG!!!! YOU'RE IT!!!!!" All through my...I mean...HER torturous elementary and middle school years those words would haunt her. Being able to catch any of the people who tagged her was similar to a rhino playing tag with a cheetah. So I developed a defense. Whenever I got tagged...I'd just pretend I never heard them and go on my merry little way. (Somewhat like I did with being blogger tagged). So short story made REALLY long, I suppose it's time to face my fears and be "it" in blogger tag!!

Factoid numero uno: See tragic coming of age story above

Factoid numero two: I'm really horrible at math. I still have to count on my fingers for simple addition problems. Seeing this usually instills great confidence into my patients as I figure out on my fingers if the baby has to eat in 3 hours and it's now 9pm what time will baby need to eat?!

Factoid numero three: I once found a solution for world peace, but then thought of how many people I'd be putting out of a job (media, reporters, suicide bombers) and scrapped the whole thing.

Factoid numero four: I'm strongly pulling to name our baby Sparkle. Regardless of whether it's a boy or girl. Jason is deathly afraid I'm serious.

Factoid numero seven: Again, I'm really bad at counting!


Now you might be wondering who I tagged: no one. For all the fat kids in the world, this is for you. I refuse to subject anyone else to the humiliation of being "IT". I'm just getting to where I don't shake anymore when I see a Tag Heuer watch, or see Tag body spray, or see a sign for a red tag sale. Now please excuse me, I need to go drown my sorrows in a twinkie!

Coming soon....

What a great weekend!! I say this every year, but I can't believe convention has already come and gone. Altamont was this weekend and it was such a needed convention for me. It was so great to see those who we seem to only see once a year and be renewed and encouraged once again. I'm sad that it's already over and now it's back to the daily grind. Quite a few people told me I need to be more diligent in updating my blog. So hang on to your hats, this one is a doosey!!

Although I'm pretty sure most of the northeast knows by now, Jason and I have some very exciting news! The reason I seem to be sprouting a spare tire around my stomach isn't because I have been eating too much pizza lately (well maybe it is partly because of my love of pepperoni and cheese, and steak, and buffalo wings, and Pringles, and twinkies....) but mainly because....We're going to be parents! We are so excited and a little nervous at the same time. I mean, the SPCA makes you fill out a 20 page in depth application along with a home study and background check before you adopt a stray dog, but for some reason, bringing a child into this world comes with no paperwork! I'm due March 2nd and am officially 12 weeks today. Also, without sounding like I'm already bragging, I have to say we may have the most photogenic child in the world. I think this may be the best ultrasound picture I've ever seen. (it was taken at 8 weeks)

(Notice how the ultrasound tech wrote "baby" on the picture. I'm not sure if I should be offended that she thinks we'd be looking at the picture going "What in the world is that thing?!?" or maybe she thought without her standing there pointing out to us the baby we'd become lost when looking at the picture and hand it to people going "I don't know where it is, but she said somewhere on here is a picture of a baby!" )

Anyways, he's facing away from the camera, so you can see his ears, back and little tiny hands and feet. Now before everyone runs out and starts buying blue, we don't know if it's a boy or a girl! I just tend to call every baby a boy. We've decided that we don't want to find out. We want it to be a surprise. (You're welcome Claude!)

Now being the thrifty people that we are we've also sent out notifications to all of the popular gossip magazines such as People and US Weekly. We figure if they'll pay 14 million for pictures of Brad and Angelina's babies, they'll probably be willing to pay at least a dollar fifty for a picture of ours! Let the bidding begin!!

Now against my better judgement, I'm going to put one of those little baby ticker things at the top of my blog. I'm always afraid that some wacko is reading my blog and will be watching the ticker and then right before I'm due they'll grab me and hold me for ransom. So to all you wackos out there (other than the one's I know read this blog and constantly tell me to update... :0) ) Don't try and pull anything because first off, I'm well armed! At all times I have with me a mag light (to beat you with), a pocket knife, an assortment of ninja stars, and numchucks. Secondly, you probably would be lucky if you even got 20 dollars out of Jason! I've had such wicked mood swings lately he'd probably be thankful for the quiet!! In fact, they've been so bad you might even pay Jason to take me back! So don't get any bright ideas.

Until next time!!!

Mr and Mrs Jeffrey Pillis

It's official!!! On Saturday, July 12th, Jeff and Britta were married!! Can't believe the big day has already come and gone, but I'm so happy that Britta is a part of our family now! Jason and I flew to Baltimore Thursday morning where mom and dad picked us up. Then the 4 of us drove down to North Carolina. The wedding was absolutely beautiful and we had a great weekend of pre-wedding fun. Hold on, because I plan on posting TONS of pictures! (thanks to mom and dad and Betty for some of their pictures)

Britta and Charlie getting ready to rehearse

Rehearsal Dinner at Mama Dips

Cooking brunch in the barn on Saturday morning

The Bridal Party

Sisters (Jessamy, Britta, and Rebecca)

Whew!! That should just about cover every angle!!! I'd add more but I have to go to work tonight so this will have to be all! The wedding was so gorgeous and we're so excited for Jeff and Britta!! Congratulations you two!!! We love ya!