Most Photogenic Animal

The winner of most photogenic animal at the Toronto Zoo, Boxing Day, 2006 goes to...
(drum roll)...

This Baby Mountain Goat!!!

Runners up: other mountain goats, a camel, turtles, foxes, a hippo's foot. Rather than bore you with endless zoo shots, I thought I'd just post the best. As you probably guessed, I got a new camera for Christmas. It's got a wicked zoom, so you no longer have to use a magnifying glass, or any "Where's Waldo" skills to find the animals in my snapshots. So now I'm on my way to becoming a professional goatographer.

Super Happy Nativity Scene

Hey, I got around to making a new X-mas flash afterall! I'm not usually this traditional but what's X-mas without a nativity scene?




Merry Christmas Everyone!

12 Days of Christmas...OR LESS!

I know it's hard to believe, at least for the snowless citizens of B-town, Ontario, that Christmas is coming THIS WEEKEND. So I thought I'd get everyone in the spirit by posting this flash I made last year. No, I'm not just lazily rehashing old cartoons, I'm creating my own Christmas tradition. Every year, me and my blogger peeps can gather around our computers for a showing of this, admittedly shoddily made, yet somewhat amusing, flashterpiece. Then get yea to the mall, there's not much time left!

Merry Christmas Everyone! (even if you're not Christian. Hey, I'm not Christian either).

Prenatal Horror Theatre

Lately I've been having some feelings of apprehension regarding my appending delivery. Okay, okay, more like terror. Some things that have contributed to my fears:

• Being that I have lead a very sheltered life, I haven't really experienced any real pain. I don't even have cramps when I get my period, so I can't even fathom what labour will be like.
• Our most recent prenatal class talked all about labour and delivery. We watched videos in which women gave birth. Even though they did all the breathing and pain management BS that people talk about, it still looked like a horror show. Was this supposed to make me feel better about going through labour? It didn't.
• I'm of the philosophy that no pain is better than pain, so I plan to have an epidural. But then I saw this episode of Bringing Home Baby where the mom had super big headaches from her epidural, when she stood up or sat up. They were so bad that she couldn't even get up to go to the washroom and her husband had to bedpan her! This seemed to defeat the whole purpose of an epidural. A browse of the internet told me this was rare, and that it happens when the needle goes too deep and some spinal fluid leaks out. It can also cause double vision and hearing problems, because basically your brain doesn't have enough fluid to float in. They can try to patch the hole by sucking blood our of your arm and injecting it in your spine, but then you might get meningitus. I hate needles enough without having to read all this!

The Dream

So last night I had this dream that I was in the hospital. I hadn't even had any contractions yet but for some reason I knew that I was about to go into labour (I don't think I was being induced, I just knew somehow). I thought that I would wait until I was farther along in labour before they would give me an epidural. That's usually how they do things in real life.

Instead, they came in right away, a nurse and a black guy in OR scrubs that I knew was the anesthesiologist. They didn't even ask if I wanted an epidural, they just said it was time, and that was that. I leaned over while sitting on the bed to receive the needle. The anesthesiologist was about to put the needle in, but the bed was so bouncy that I couldn't sit still enough. I remember asking him if he'd had any patients who'd had an epidural headache. He said he hadn't done that many, but I didn't know if he meant that he hadn't given that many epidurals, or if not that many of his patients had had the headache. I was scared that the bouncy bed would make him slip and make the needle go too deep. Eventually we just had to take the mattress off the bed so I had a flat place to sit.

The epidural seemed to work okay after that. So maybe it'll be okay.

The Good Symptoms

Today my arm hurts, especially when I move it. It feels like the tendons and muscles have to stretch beyond capacity just to move my elbow properly. This is similar to what happens to my calves sometimes when I get a leg cramp. I don't even have to look it up to know that this is yet another bizarre symptom of pregnancy. Honestly, what do my limbs have to do with growing a baby?

At this point I could grow a third arm (something that would be pretty useful right about now) and I would just be like "ho hum, yet another pregnancy symptom nobody told me about".

Even before I knew about all the weirdness, I was never one of those women who wanted to be pregnant. I wanted kids, and pregnancy was just something I had to go through so I could be a mommy. Now that I'm going through the experience, I do have to say that there are some enjoyable bits, such as:

• Baby kicks. This is hands down the best part of being pregnant. It starts at about 4 months with something that could actually be gas and increases it intensity until you have this other-worldly creature manipulating your belly from the inside. Honestly I could be the star of the next Aliens movie. When he really goes to town you can see these kicks from the outside. He moves fast too, rolling across my belly like he's dodging bullets. The novelty never really wears off either because the kid gets stronger and stronger. At this point I can kind of see the shape of him when he comes to the surface. Though I'm still not sure what part is his head.
• Not having my period. I've said it before and I'll say it again. I love not having my period. This is probably the reason why some people have 17 kids, and why some mothers continue breastfeeding until their kid is in college (breastfeeding can sometimes keep you from getting your period too). Of course, I know I'm not really avoiding my period, just banking it so I can get all the weeks at once after I deliver. Better to get it all over with in one shot, says I.
• Being the centre of attention. The pregnant bump is a great conversation piece and it means everyone around me talks to me about babies. This is fabulous because I get SO bored with small talk about the weather, what people do for a living, celebrity gossip, relationships, politics, and the weather. Did I mention the weather? Who cares! Babies is a topic I can get interested in. In fact, it's all I think about. That, and what I'm going to eat next.
• My super appetite. I can eat as much now as my 6'2" husband (usually), and when I get exactly what I want, the food tastes more delicious than ever. Sure, I'm gaining weight, but it's all going towards my boobs and baby (in that order).

That's all I can think of right now. I should also mention that I got a phone interview to be on the show "Birth Days" a Life Network show that I gather is the Canadian equivalent of TLC's Bringing Home Baby. Even if they choose us, we might not do it. Adam's shy about being on camera (I find most guys who are into photography are). Anyway the lady who talked to me seemed to want Adam and I to have conflict, but unfortunately for her we're the perfect couple.

Wicked!

I'm a big Wizard of Oz fan, so Wicked the musical wasn't a very hard sell for me. Turns out the Wicked Witch of the West wasn't that evil after all. She was just misunderstood, 'cause she was green. The big mystery of the show for me was how Elphaba (the witch's name in the musical) was able to touch the other characters without getting green make-up all over them. I'm thinking they just made the actor eat nothing but spinach and green jello for 3 months.

Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed the play. I was so into the character that, knowing she was to be melted, I felt all tense and sad and scared for her.

Some highlights:

• Finding out how the lion, the tinman, and the scarecrow came to be
• The big mechanical wizard head
• The flying monkeys (they were neat-looking, much more so than in the flick)

I'm going to have to watch the Wizard of Oz again now to see if I can answer all my "now wait a second, if she isn't really wicked then in the movie why did she..." questions.

If it's good enough for Bon Jovi's kid

For the past few months (basically since we found out I was pregnant) Adam has been trolling the internet, looking for the most new, innovative, and expensive stroller technology. Daily, the husband shows me videos and quotes reviews about these stylish yet over-priced items. A stroller is like baby's first car, and should our little bundle have the sportiest model?

We talked seriously about getting the bugaboo, the trendiest and most high-priced of the lot. These things are everywhere, which is surprising since it costs $1000, and that's if we smuggled it across the US border illegally, avoiding taxes and duty by calling on my father-in-law's Polish mafia connections in New York.

My reason for going along with the plan to spend a sizable portion of baby's college fund on a stylish pram, is that many of these expensive models have reversible seats. Meaning baby can have the traditional outward facing position, or he can face Mommy. Now I read somewhere (likely when I was interning at Today's Parent) that if a child faces his his mommy (or daddy) while in his baby carriage there will be more bonding between parent and child, mommy will talk to baby and baby will observe how words are formed by watching her lips, baby will therefore learn to talk quicker, he will develop a stronger vocabulary than babies in front-facing strollers, he will learn to read faster, he will do better in school, and he'll grow up to be a genius.

So we got a stroller with the reversible option. We didn't have to go to another country, and we didn't have to pay a thou (close, but not quite). We settled on the Rockstar (pictured above) which comes with a bassinet so you can make it a pram, or a regular stroller seat that you can recline at all different angles and face any way you like. Bon Jovi endorces this carriage, so you know it's cool.

Plus, it comes in red.