A good week

On Thursday we had our last ultrasound. Insider became shy and covered her face with her stubby chubby little arms and hands so we couldn't see her, but we're told she is well. According to her head size, belly size, and thigh bone size, she weighed about 4 lbs. 14 oz. which is 59th percentile. And she should grow 1/2 pound a week from now til she is born. My fibroid is also doing well, shrinking a teensy bit, which is lovely. The doctor will not check it again until after the birth.

That night we had our second Hypnobirthing class, and I am getting into it. Dave would greatly like to make fun of the whole thing, but is being very kind in his restraint. I think it is working for me because I believe it can. I love the teacher and am reaching deeper and deeper levels of relaxation, even experiencing the "euphoric relaxation state" they talk about. Dave is having a harder time getting out of his "conscious mind" and during one exercise (unrelated to birth preparation) the teacher was guiding us through a technique that should help people who have a hard time falling asleep (i.e. David Insomniac Fuhriman). Supposed to be much more effective than regular stuff like counting sheep, you follow her direction and imagine the alphabet appearing and disappearing in order (it's a little more involved than this, but that's the gist) and after she led everyone through the exercise Dave popped his head up.

"Is it normal that I couldn't relax during it because I was trying to figure out if the letters in my head should be capital or lowercase?" Dave asked laughing. "And also what font they should be in?"

Grinning, he looked around the room for support. It should be noted that this is not a particularly joke-y group. Um, silence. No one would meet his eyes. Dave continued, thinking maybe they didn't catch his drift.

"You know, like Times New Roman? Or Garibaldi?" Dave kept chuckling encouragingly and nodding at the other men for back-up. People chuckled back weakly. "Is that normal?" he asked again, grinning. Everyone was silent. The teacher made some polite mumbles. Someone changed the subject. Aaaaaanyway. But overall it's going well.

Sunday was our one-year anniversary! We celebrated by spending the weekend at the beach house and it was great.

("One year-YEAH!")

We went to a Scandinavian festival too, heard some yodeling, ate authentic foods, and Dave participated in the annual pole raising. Dave poses here with a Viking warrior.

And he snapped this picture because one of the delicacies had the word "kaka" in it.

We spent the better part of the weekend learning how addicting Scrabble on the iPhone can be, and ate at Dooger's (my favorite seafood place in Cannon Beach). On Saturday morning we took a very brisk 2 1/2 hour walk on the beach at 5 am to watch the sunrise, and realized afterwards we might have overdone it a bit. I was sure both my left foot and tailbone had somehow broken from the exertion, and when Dave woke up the next day, he declared that his legs felt "partially chopped off." We woke up on Sunday to a giant rainbow that had formed over the ocean, and for dinner Sunday night we bought some fresh clams from the coast and Dave cooked them up delightfully. And it was also Father's Day, wherein Dave proved what a wonderful Doggy-Dad he is, as Pixie came home with fleas from being boarded, and around 1 am began madly attacking herself with the scratching and biting. Her whole sad self became a stringy mess of dried saliva. Dave made a middle-of-the-night flea shampoo run and we were able to relieve her of her parasites and her itchies. We cheered as the dead fleas floated down the drain. (There were only two. Apparently Pixie is very sensitive.)

We are lucky to have such a kind and wonderful Daddy, and Insider will be very lucky too. :)