Moody Mania: Touches and Such

This past week my little jelly bean has definitely started to make an appearance, and all of the sudden everyone and their mother seemingly has free reign of touching and rubbing my stomach.

It really caught me off guard at first, but because people mean well I tried to put myself in their shoes and rationalize this in my mind.

Would you go up and rub someone's back tumor?

Or say, "Hey buddy, that's some mole on your face. Can I touch it?"

Would I be going overboard by monogramming this symbol on all my shirts?

...or nonchalantly wearing a belt comprised of barbed wire?

All new from Ann Taylor's 'punk' collection.

But I have come to the realization that this is only the beginning, and I can only imagine what it'll be like a few months from now.

Until then, I'll have to suppress my usual disdain of being rubbed and inspected like a scientific experiment. Because by the grace of God, this baby bump will only get bigger.

On that note, I received an email this week from thebump.com (creatively named by the founders of the knot.com wedding website). I suppose the next life stage will be thebox.com where you select your casket. I digress.

Among a sea of emails alerting me of Loft sales, Twitter updates, and work related crap (on which I'll elaborate shortly), one email from thebump.com stood out among the rest.

The subject read: "Congratulations! Your baby is the size of an avocado this week."

A what??? Yuck!

A) Who eats those things?

B) Since when do we use food as a reasonable term of measurement?

This ladder is 30 celery sticks high.

If the head honchos at thebump.com would like to reach a larger variety of their subscribers, perhaps the measurement list should be updated with things that will make immediate sense to people like me. For example:

Your baby is the size of a Cheeto puff:

Or a Snicker's Bar (not the King Size one just yet):

Or as tall as a Pixi stick.

Now you're speaking my language. Until then, let's leave this avocado nonsense out of the equation.

Someone told me the sweetest thing this past weekend. By keeping up with what parts of your baby are developing in a particular week it gives you something to pray about. In week 17 the ears are developing. There is no doubt in my mind that my child will look like this on the next ultrasound.

"Mama, please stop all that talking!"

Ryan and I had a wonderful wedding weekend with Maggie and Aaron. We love them dearly and were glad to be a part of their special day.

This past Sunday will from hence forth be recognized as Reptile Day. Allow me to explain.

A lizard joined us during our Sunday School lesson.

And later that evening a 3 1/2 foot snake was waiting for us when we returned to our house.

Our neighbor, Jim, chose the right time to walk out in his yard as I called out for help. While I'm sure snake wrestling wasn't originally in his evening plans, he got it out of the yard for us. Sweet man!!!

After such a whirlwind weekend all I wanted to do was relax, but then Sunday night it hit me: Monday was right around the corner, meaning the next day was the first of FIVE that I'd have to endure the workforce. Now I know why they call it that.

Various definitions of "force:"

A) to put strain on

B) to produce with effort against one's will

C) to inflict or impose relentlessly

That sounds about right.

Now back by popular demand I present to you an all new list of things I'd rather be doing this week than dealing with work and/or life's daily frustrations (I'm sure many of you can relate):

Counting the grains of sand used in this massive sculpture