warning: lots of caps-usage.

so...after my long stint of posting pretty much every day (then setting the date stamps for later so that people wouldn't catch on to just HOW frequently i was blogging), i kind of dropped off the face of the earth. here's the 411 on all things van voorst:

..atticus and i had the flu at the beginning of this week. NOT. FUN.

..i felt the baby move for the first time this morning.

..todd and i carved pumpkins last night. i carved "tom brady" ish. todd carved a dashing tom sellack.

..atticus can clap, wave, high-five, and stick out his tongue, and has been experimenting with new dance moves (including one we like to call the 'magic man'). no words yet...:(

..atticus had to be woken up at 8:15 yesterday morning, and still took awesome naps. it was amazing.

..we're going to the cornerstone openhouse this afternoon, and atticus will be the stinkin' cutest tiger.

..in a week and a half, i'm going to start watching kaiden beukelman during the day.

..on thursday i got to hang out with my good friend megan for the first time in MONTHS!!

..everyone at todd's office dressed up for halloween yesterday, and todd went as his dad. hilarious.

..we attended a rock band party at andy's a couple weeks ago, and atticus really got into the spirit of things as well.

..last weekend, we got to see both todd's parents and my parents for the birthday hoopla weekend (our moms' birthdays are on the 23rd and todd's birthday is on the 24th - crazy). it was awesome!

..not to toot my own sewing machine or anything, but i made the CUTEST christmas stockings out of salvation army sweaters the other day.

i can't believe that tomorrow is NOVEMBER already! i'm SO SO SO excited for the holidays this year. i usually get excited, but this year it's different...i think it's because last year we didn't do much advanced planning for thanksgiving because atticus was due the 30th (so i didn't want to cook, and i didn't want to drive anywhere). and since he was born 3 weeks before christmas, we didn't do much there either - it was the first year ever i didn't have a christmas tree...:(.

so this year i'm prepared to go ALL OUT. the thanksgiving menu is already being fine-tuned, and i'm planning planning planning for christmas decorating. (we still can't have a tree this year, due to space issues and the fact that we realized that our lease doesn't allow us to have a real christmas tree and we don't own a fake one. plus, atticus would be all up in the tree's grill.) oh man, this year is going to ROCK!!!!!

however, as a welcome addition to the typical holidays, atticus also has a first birthday party in between to plan for! so i've also started thinking about that...oh man, so much to think about and i'm SO STINKING EXCITED. any bash ideas, pass them my way!

big kid foods

when atticus was four months, we got really excited about the prospect of introducing baby foods and started having him eat one or two meals a day in addition to nursing. but to be honest, the excitement kind of waned for both me and atticus, and it became more of a hassle than anything. between making the baby food and freezing it (which really was the easiest part of it all) then actually struggling through feeding him, it really didn't seem worth it considering atticus' lack of interest. so we kind of scrapped that and went back to nursing exclusively. not that we didn't give him crackers or bananas or something to keep him occupied at the table while we ate dinner, we just didn't do deliberate "meals" for him.

when my milk supply started to dwindle, i started feeding him a solid-foods breakfast so i could pump in the morning to supplement throughout the rest of the day. so he was eating cream of wheat and a banana, then nursing (or, recently, taking formula) the rest of the day.

so now that he's almost 11 months, he's able to eat some of what we eat for dinner, so i think it's time to transition him to table foods. this week he's eaten spaghetti, fried rice, and chicken with couscous and sauteed carrots. i think i'll probably start doing lunches for him as well, and maybe a snack or two.

i think with the next one i'll try to just skip the whole 'pureed veggie' stage. i feel like, in our personal situation, it was overrated and unnecessary. and a huge hassle for everyone involved. but i'm excited to move him to table foods! he's becoming a real little person! pretty soon he'll be asking for an after-dinner decaf while he watches the news.

my current babe faves.

as a baby, i have definite preferences.

..i do not like yogurt. at all.
..i do like trying to play in the toilet.
..i do not like getting out of the bathtub.
..i do like sticking out my tongue.
..i do not like being left out of dinnertime.
..i do like dancing like a maniac.
..i do not like having my diaper changed.
..i do like any and all strangers.
..i do not like it when people take away my cell phone. it's mine.
..i do like clapping my hands.
..i do not like my sippy cup. because i can't figure it out.

other things i like:
..fish hooking people in the lip.
..chicken pot pie.
..any and all things nuk.
..being naked. and peeing on the floor.
..fake chuckling.
..going grocery shopping, or on any kind of special trip.
..walking around like a pro.
..reading books about babies.
..other babies. preferably little ones that can't run away when i fish hook them.

maybe i'll learn to like being a big brother. i don't really know what "big brother" means, except that i have to play by myself all day while mommy lays on the couch like a bump on a log. so...not panning out for me so far, but we'll see.

stinky head.

in the name of safer cosmetics, i found myself buying bulk organic shampoo and conditioner at wheatsfield. (it's actually comparable in price to the normal shampoo i buy, which is great.) it's ingredients are all recognizable, and most even edible, which is a good sign.

so i got it home, used it once...and found myself stepping out of the shower smelling like a really clean hippie. seriously, people. i love patchouli as much as the next sensitive-to-smells preggo, but just because it's organic doesn't mean it has to smell like the inside of an opium den.

10 weeks

when we were pregnant with atticus, i called him reptar until his human parts were confirmed by ultrasound. with this one, i'm not sure what i will be calling him/her...
(in case you were wondering, no that is not an actual photo of my personal uterus.)

so i googled alien names...i'm deciding between gog, phim, and zhom. any thoughts?

according to babycenter.com, the landmarkers of this week are a grapefruit-sized uterus, noticeable-to-me weight gain, and the a-ok from doctors to continue swimming. according to van voorst family life, the landmarkers of this week include:

*an insatiable love for the couch, sweet pickles, cream cheese, hot chocolate, and CSI:NY.
*a repulsion to most smells, including shampoos and detergents (especially "baby"-scented ones), dirty diapers (go figure), onions, canteloupe, cooked meat, and...ahem, the after affects of todd eating tacos.
*no motivation (and an exuse not) to clean the bathrooms - plus, poor me, the smell of cleaner grosses me out...too bad.
*a lovely gut of what i fondly refer to as pldgne (yep, you read it right) around my middle, and (on the rare occasion that i'm not still in my pajamas) the high-style fashion statement of unzipped pants.
*nearly constant nausea (but very little puking, praise the lord!)
*and of course, the too-long-missed restless legs of pregnancy.

oh, how i miss the days when i thought pregnancy was cute.

really, though, it's all still sinking in. i can't believe i have two kids. we're currently living the american dream...although i'll have to get permission from the landlords to put up a picket fence...maybe i'll just buy some picket fence window decals. no, the new baby will probably eat them... i don't know what i'm talking about.

i'm really excited, and really overwhelmed, thinking about the fact that we will have two babies soon...they'll only be 17 months apart! which is good on the one hand - we want a big family, and i don't want to have infants (and later, teenagers) in my house for 20 years straight because we decided to put 3 or 4 years between each one. but the thought of two tiny kiddos...oh my. (then jacqui suggested the possibility of twins...um, scary?)

anyway, this post was pointless. so: votes for fetus nicknames, and predictions of gender? help a girl out.

the name of the game: survival.

who knew that being pregnant with a 10-month-old would be hard work? (not that i'm pregnant with a 10-month-old; how gross and engorged would i look?! i'm just pregnant while also taking care of a 10-month-old, for clarification.)

now that i'm 10 weeks pregnant, most of what i do is lie on the couch all day in my pajamas, while atticus crawls around in his pajamas. it's been a "pajama" kind of month. yes, until yesterday there were 6 loads' worth of unfolded laundry on my couch. yes, there are tons of dirty dishes in the sink because the dishwasher hasn't been unloaded yet. yes, there is (a disgusting amount of) toothpaste splatter on my bathroom mirrors. yes, there are baby handprints all over my coffee table glass (and my glasses lenses). and no, i don't do much about it.

atticus' favorite game lately is to walk up to me (since i'm usually laying on the couch, we're at eye-level) and smack me in the face over and over before he steals my glasses. then he fish-hooks me and goes about his merry way. hmm...perhaps latently angry at me for not playing with him? or...just likes to hit stuff? probably the second, but my pregnancy hormones make me worry for the first.

luckily, he doesn't seem to notice that we're working our way away from nursing. i had really wanted to continue nursing so i really did try to keep going (shh, don't tell the doctors), but atticus was crying as soon as i'd set him down after feeding him. he was super clingy and whiny, and i noticed that the more i pumped, the less i made (as in, down from 13 ounces in the morning to 5).

so i crossed my fingers and tried formula, knowing that he had always refused it before. i think he was so hungry that he would've taken pickle juice if i put it in his bottle - i felt so bad. apparently, i'm not even making 1.5 ounces at a normal feeding, so he sucked down a ton of formula even right after i had nursed him.

so now, i'm giving him formula twice a day and nursing him once if i've made enough. pretty soon i'm sure i won't be making anything, but for the time being it's making the transition easier for everyone. i don't have to quit cold-turkey (which has both emotional and, ahem, physical implications) and we both have time to adjust to the idea of formula (taste being the issue for one of us, cost being the issue for the other - i'll leave you to figure out whose problem is whose).

on top of all this, atticus has a cold and we're teaching him to cry it out at night instead of needing to have us find his nuk for him 2-3 times a night. (yes, if you're wondering, we did this once before, then somehow found ourselves back in the habit of getting up with him.) so it's been rough on him, poor kid. not to mention that in 30 weeks he will no longer be the tiniest van voorst... but we don't have to worry him with that now :)

so i've prioritized. is it essential that he not have his nuk during the day? nope - most of the time when he wants it, i let him have it. is it essential that he have four baths a week? nope - unless he's gelled his hair with bananas, i do it once or twice a week. is it crucial that the house be pristine? nope - we have connection group here on sunday, so the public areas will be clean, but my own bathroom mirror will continue being gunky. and i'm so okay with this.

whew. blogging wore me out. i think it's time to go lay back down.