Almost There

Anna took this picture. She had given me a make over (which did not include brushing my hair but she did do my lipstick). I look like a study in round.

I am almost 39 weeks along now and after my dr appointment today can say I am two, maybe two and a half centimeters dilates. It's nice to see that things are moving along. Today the doctor brought up inducing me. I was induced with Anna on the day after my due date ( more because I cried in the office than any other reason). We decided to just wait for things to kind of happen on their own for now. Occasionally I have contractions but they don't really hurt, they are more just uncomfortable. I realized today that I would rather get as dilated as possible before the real pain kicks in. So, no rush on the inducing.

We're working on getting ready. A friend of mine is throwing me a shower next week (side note: when your due date is right after Christmas and a lot of people go to other places for the holidays, you have late showers, I've noticed). I've talked to some people about watching Anna when we go to the hospital so she has somewhere to go. I washed the carseat cover and we bought a new base for it. I also washed things like the blankets we have, sheets and the newborn size clothes. I figure I'll wait to wash the rest until we have a place to put them all, like a dresser. I have every intention of putting together a hospital bag sometime soon.

Putting together the hospital bag early is not really our strong point (I don't think we did it until we went to the dr appointment where I cried). I figure, I'll have plenty of time to do it when we are ready to go to the hospital. After all, my contractions have to be at five minutes apart for an hour before we need to go in. More than enough time to stick some stuff in a bag. Plus, a lot of things I'm currently using so I don't want to pack them until the last minute anyway. I plan on putting up a list for Jason so we don't forget anything. Don't you love the way I justify my procrastination?

Another Anna shot. I'm starting to grow out of my maternity clothes, not a good sign. All in all, I don't think I'm too big because when I tell people I'm due in a week, they seem surprised. Plus, I still feel like I can get around (I've even been known to sit on the floor and get up by myself - yes, I'm bragging) and, most importantly, my turkey timer hasn't popped yet.

So we are gearing up for this baby to come. It should be soon. I keep thinking about what I'd do if my water were to break right then. I kind of feel like a ticking time bomb waiting to go off.

Honolulu City Lights

After Christmas we went to a Honolulu tradition called Honolulu City Lights. This is something they do every year and have for 27 years. Basically, around the city hall, or Honolulu Hale, the city puts up big Christmas themed statues, have lights in the trees, rides for kids and all kinds of decorations in the City Hall.

We had a lot of fun walking around and seeing the decorations.

Santa and Mrs. Claus hanging out by the fountain. There was more to this one but there were so many people I couldn't get it all without having people block parts.

Anna as the mermaid

and the little doll. We spent a lot of time here putting our faces in all the holes.

Anna riding the little carousel. There were four horses and although she went straight to this one before it started, once it got going, she wanted to switch. Fortunately the operator didn't mind her doing so.

Inside the Hale, they had trees that had been decorated by lots of different groups and organizations along with a little Santa's workshop type place. I think they had a Santa there before Christmas but he was gone when we went. I didn't get any pictures of this part because the lighting was bad. They had gone all out though.

Down one hallway, there were a bunch of wreaths. There had been a contest and some of them had ribbons in various categories. I found I was most interested in the non-traditional wreaths. Here are my two favorite.

A rainbow of crayons with them all melted together in the middle.

Painted rubber slippers with pictures of the people involved. This one just feels so Hawaii to me.

It was a fun evening and I was really glad we went after Christmas. At first I wanted to go before but in retrospect, I think it probably would have been too crowded to be fun.

Bishop Museum

Anna with her grandparents and the giant head outside.

The day after Christmas we visited the Bishop Museum. It's a Hawaiian museum and science center. The have several buildings with a different theme. We got a membership so we can go back and take people to come to visit.

Anna's favorite was the science building. There were lots of things to play with. They had a lava demonstration which talked about different forms of lava and volcanoes and what not. After living on the Big Island, where there is an active volcano, I already knew most of the information but it was interesting.

At the end of the lava show, they had some that had been heated and poured it out so we could see how slowly it moves.

That building also had fun big snails to climb on.

And big nenes out front. Of course, I had to join Anna on the birds.

That building also had costumes that kids can try on and pretend to be either a native or invasive species. Of course those subtleties were lost on Anna but she had a lot of fun trying things on and running around.

She is trying to "hide" in the mural on the wall. We have since gone back and there was a little boy there who wanted to chase Anna as if he was a predator. Of course, he kept ending up on wrong end of the food chain. Like a spider chasing a bird.

There is another building that has traveling exhibits. The exhibit there at the time was about Mars and what it would take to go there and if you would want to.

One activity with that was walking on Mars with less gravity. We all talked Jason into trying it out. It looked like a lot of fun but I wasn't sure they would let me do it in m current condition.

There are two other buildings, one with Hawaiian history and artifacts and stuff and a planetarium. Maybe next time we go we'll get pictures in there.

Christmas

I'll admit, I've been putting off blogging about Christmas. Frankly, I wasn't thrilled with how the day turned out. The dilemma was I didn't want this post to become a gripe session but I didn't want to say how great it was either. Falsely positive isn't really my style. So, let's see if I can capture how my Christmas was with a happy medium.

We had Jason's parents come visit us and it was fun to see them. Anna, especially, was thrilled. They came on Friday morning and left Monday evening. Not a long trip but better than nothing. The first two days they were here we went to the zoo and did some shopping.

Christmas morning was a bit odd. I was up at 5 and Anna got up maybe around 5:30. We let Jason sleep in until 6. At this point, we did stockings and got into what Santa brought.

A trunk of fun princess dress-ups. Anna must be tall because that outfit is supposed to fit together like a dress.

And of course, I had to "try on" a dress too.

We didn't open everything then because church was at 9 and we figured we would need to get ready. Of course I wasn't planning on getting up so early otherwise we might have planned on more opening before church but as it was, we had plenty of time to get ready and even got to church a little early. Anna slept through almost the whole meeting which was probably for the best.

Playing with her new song book with Papa.

After church, Jason's parents came over and we opened presents. With so few people, it took maybe half an hour before we were done so once I got dinner started, we went on a hike. It was only about a mile and a half round trip but it was all up on the way out then all down on the way back.

The view from about half-way up. After this point, we turned a corner and the wind really picked up. This kept it from getting too hot.

It's hard to strike a sassy pose when there is hair in your face. Darn wind.

We passed a lighthouse but it's not open to the public.

Jason's parents at the top.

This is my favorite of us at the top. Anna's hair makes me laugh every time I see it.

Then we came home and had dinner. I wasn't thrilled with how things turned out but other people seemed to like it (at least they said they did). Plus we managed to get through all the leftover ham before it went bad so I call that a success. We talked to family but other than that, I don't really remember what we did that evening. I guess we just hung out.

Gingerbread Houses

Anna ready to go. Sorry, the pictures are a bit dark. I did get Photoshop for my little computer but we haven't installed it yet.

Well Christmas has come and gone and now I have a minute to sit and blog about it (helped by a bit of pregnancy insomnia). A couple of days before Christmas we did gingerbread houses. After last year's debacle we decided to go with a kit this year. The one we chose had five smaller houses with it so we invited some friends over to do them with us.

Delaine and Bryant moved to the area about the same time we did. I think they came right off their honeymoon.

Putting her house together.

For some reason, the directions said to assemble the houses before decorating them and the other adults in the room seemed to think this was a good idea. It is NOT a good idea. It just makes it harder to put the candy on.

In spite of that, we had a lot of fun. Jason helped Anna with her house this year although she didn't really need much help. At one point while she was waiting for him, she picked up an icing bag and did it herself. From then on, she was on her own.

Delaine and Anna with Anna's completed house. As you can see, she really got into the landscaping.

Jason and his house. His is a bit bare bones this year since he was helping Anna. Somehow we didn't did a picture of me and my house. Probably because I was working on mine the longest. Apparently when given time and full creative license, I kind of go to town.

We were not quite sure what to do with our houses once we were done. We don't have a shelf or mantle or anything to put them on so they just hung out on the counter. In an attempt to keep the ants off of them, we covered them with plastic. Oddly enough, that didn't keep the Annas off of them. Her 'yard' was gone the next day and I don't think the house itself lasted much after Christmas. Mine and Jason's houses did last until New Year's but they had lost some pieces too. I guess when I sleep in but Anna doesn't, there is no keeping her from the candy on the counter.

Smart Cookie

A little fuzzy but I love her face in this one.

I'm pretty sure I've mentioned this before but Anna is a pretty smart little kid. I'm keeping her Christmas presents in the trunk of the car for now and she knows exactly where they are. One day we went to the beach and I was trying to keep her from looking in the trunk as I was trying to get out the beach toys and such. Apparently that made an impression because a few days later she informed me that she knew where her Christmas presents were. I tried to play it cool and may have even said something like, "I can neither confirm nor deny the presence of presets in the trunk." Unfortunately I had told her that day at the beach that she wasn't supposed to look in the trunk because that's where the presents were. Oops.

Once we established the location of the gifts, we talked about why we don't want to try to see what they are, even though we can. I told her the story of when the older kids in my family were little and they had a babysitter who showed them how to unwrap their presents very carefully to see what they were and re-wrap them again. It was one of the saddest Christmases for them because then there were no surprises on Christmas morning and they wanted to play with what was under the tree before Christmas but couldn't. After telling her this story, she seemed to fully understand that it's better to wait.

Then the other day, Anna asked if we could put her tutu under the tree. I wasn't sure what she was talking about (although I did get her a tutu for Christmas) and Anna told me that she saw it in the trunk the other day when Jason was getting something out of the trunk. Oops. At least I wasn't planning on having it for a Santa present. I told her no and she hasn't brought it up since. Of course with her, I know it's not forgotten. Good thing Christmas is coming so soon.

Ornaments

Since our Christmas decorations are all in storage, I decided to try making our ornaments this year. The thought being that it would be more economical. I'm not actually sure if it was or not but it turned out fun and Anna even got to help on some.

I divided them into two kinds, those I could do with Anna around and helping and those I needed to do on my own. The latter category included those that needed a glue gun. With Anna, we made clothes pin reindeer. Mine looked pretty standard. Anna, not to be tied down by convention had a whole slew of different looks.

Most of them looked like the one on the far right. We decided they were girl reindeer (so no antlers). The other kind we made together are pom pom snowmen who are not quite done. They are put together but need faces and such. I'll post those when they are done.

The ornaments I made on my own are mainly things glued to styrofoam balls and fun with buttons. So, here are the styrofoam ball ones, mostly involving ribbons. I made two of each one.

I especially like the way the red ribbon looks on this one. I wish I had thought of it before I did the white ones but oh well.

These are split peas. They took a bit a work but I really like the way they turned out. I divided the ball into four parts and alternated the round and the flat sides of the peas for variety.

Then onto the button ones. I first got the idea for these from Martha Stewart and went from there.

These are more red and burgundy. I'm not sure why they look so pink. Then I worked on putting buttons on the styrofoam balls.

This one is a tad harder to see because of the way Anna is holding it. It's a Christmas tree out of buttons with the buttons getting larger as you go down.

And a snowflake. Anna helped a little bit with these last two and discovered the hazards of the glue gun. Mainly that the glue can come through the button holes or ribbon and burn you.

We also noticed that we lost the baby Jesus for our nativity set so I glues ribbons on the rest of the characters and put them on the tree (Joseph is in the picture with the red and green wreath).

So this is what I have been doing with my evenings when I'm too tired to go shopping but have enough energy to sit up at the table. I'm quite pleased with how they have all turned out and hope to hold onto them for some time.