The glow of pregnancy

Here's me, showing off my World-Championship Ladies Bowling League gear.

No, wait, that's not it. Those are my "ROCK ON!" eyes and snarl.

No... no... hang on, I'll get it: These are the wrist braces I purchased today from Walgreen's so that my hands will cease feeling like they've been ground to stumps with a hacksaw.

Carpal tunnel, baby. One of the many millions of things they just don't tell you about pregnancy. I never had carpal tunnel before -- even though I've worked mostly at the computer for ten years. AJ gave me a mild case, which never completely disappeared but had become mostly unnoticeable until a few months ago. But that was just some tingling and numbness. Baby #2 is really letting me know how much she needs my good blood flow with PAAAAAIN. So I'm sporting my Hott New Look for winter. In a lovely twist of fate, the weather's gotten warm enough for short sleeves here, for a couple of days, so I can't even hide these monstrosities under a nice sweater. I feel like the biggest dork! All for a good cause, of course, and the braces actually do seem to help. They're a bitch to type with (again, ironic since that's probably why/how I got it in the first place), but the real test will be sleeping with them tonight. That's when the pain level usually shoots up to eleven -- sometimes I'll wake up at night to pee and have to shake and massage my wrists out for ten minutes before they loosen back up.

In other pregnancy griping, my stomach hurts. Just... all the time. I mean, crampy kind of hurting. No, it's not REALLY all the time, just seems like a lot. Don't worry, I have counted. No more than one "contraction" (Braxton-Hicks, obviously) in any given hour. They just seem long. Maybe I'm doing too much. Maybe I need to spend more time on the couch with my friends Haagen and Dazs.

While I was in Walgreen's, I peeked at InStyle magazine's cover story on Katie Holmes. I had no idea she is 30. Here I thought she was a teenage bride but, not really. Just a girl, in love with a boy, OH SIIIIIGHhhhhh, and she loves being a mom. I was disappointed the interviewer didn't ask her one single time if Tom is as wacko as he seems. It was all, like, professional and benefit-of-the-doubt and stuff. Oh well. Katie said "the weather is here, wish you were [as] beautiful [as me]." (Truly, the photos of her were somewhat bizarre and beautiful.)

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Have I told you my secret weapon for parenting? J-E-L-L-O. I swear, the days I make it, you'd think I hung the very moon. Today, just hinting that there was Jello in the fridge for dessert meant AJ cleaned up his snack debris, played nicely with the neighbor kids, read stories willingly with his Dad while I got dinner ready, Pleased and Thank You'd all through the meal ("Mama, do you want me to please pass anything to you?"), patiently endured his bath/shampoo, and went to bed when I said "It's bedtime."

Maybe I'm wrong -- maybe it's the new dresser. But I think it's the Jello.

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Today I received my customized Starbucks gift card in the mail. Have you heard of this? You can create "art," or simply choose a coffee cup with your "signature" drink spelled out on it, or any number of other mod designs. I can't wait to use it tomorrow. Thanks, Mom!