My hidden natures

Pregnant ladies love to organize. It's almost like a disease. I noticed that I spent more time and money shopping for "containers", "drawers", "hangers" and all things you can name at Container Store than anything else nowadays, well except for baby stuff. That shit is expensive.

At Container Store or Target, you see pregnant ladies at any aisle you go to. No frigging kidding you! I don't know. Maybe I noticed the pregnant ladies more nowadays than before because I am also one of them . Holy shit, did I just admit that I have become one of them?

I hate organizing even though I am a very organized and detail-oriented person when it comes to work. But household stuff, I don't think I am ever born to do it. I can't fold clothes, for one. And this might be one thing that if my husband ever divorced me one day, would be because I can't fold clothes.

With the baby coming in 3 months, I constantly think about how to make room for him and for ourselves. Our place is meant to entertain, so to create a space that is welcoming is so important to me. Right now, we only have a couple more boxes in the soon to be nursery waiting to be cleaned out. This is good progress.

When seeing those stackable drawers at Container Store, it makes me calm. And when I install and place all the drawers and containers in my apartment, I feel so accomplished. It makes me smile. So I do have that in me - the nesting nature.

How strange. I feel more motherly each day and I discovered my nesting nature. Is it all because the hormones? I think yes. Hormones totally eff'ed me up.

These pregnancy hormones also bring out my protecting nature: the other day when walking on a busy street, there were a couple kids running towards my direction. Because I am short, those kids probably had the height that is at my belly. As they ran towards me, one kid was so close to me that forced me to hold my left arm up to not just try to block him, I pushed him, in front of his mom.

I never used to do that. In fact, TB always had to remind me to not walk to close to people and always have my arms up to create the space. The fact that I actually pushed that poor kid surprised me. Yeah, don't ever mess with a mother, she will eat you alive.

This is actually quite awesome. I always know I am feisty but never thought I'd be physical. I can't wait to see anything like this will happen again soon. Next time, I will curse and fight anyone who gets in my belly's way.


#mothernature
DearJulie

9/19 - Our anniversary

Holy Shit! I almost forgot it's our anniversary today. My stupid pregnant brain is messing me up. I even spilt coffee all over myself this morning.

To be specific, it's our wedding anniversary. And yes, we do and try to celebrate other anniversaries, like, the very first date, the very first kiss, the very first time he finally said I love You, and the first of a lot of things. Yeah DearJulie is cheesy. She likes all the girly stuff. Though we don't celebrate 2/14. For the record, we celebrate 2/15.

BUT, I never demand gifts. Because TB always says that he is the best gift he could ever give me. I could ask for no more.

It's only been two years and so much has happened - so much that I didn't expect has happened. Blueberry seems to know how exciting 9/19 is for us because he has been kicking non-stop today. Yes, blueberry is definitely something we didn't fully expect. We thought this guy would wait until the year of horse.

This year, no trip and no gift, no special reason - I really don't need anything. I already have TB - the best husband ever. And, we do need to save money for raising a baby. Babies are frigging expensive. I don't understand how people, especially people who couldn't afford, can keep pooping babies. I mean, knowing how expensive raising babies is, that's enough to stop a guy from getting up. Don't you think?

Here's the vow I wrote on our wedding day and I read it in front of all our family and friends: it's framed and hung in my office.

My Kelvin, my Copain* - the one I share the bread with.
It took me a long time to learn how to live with you.
Now, I realized I can never live without you.

Thank you for letting me be the independent me.
Thank you for letting me be the feminist me.

As much as it goes against my feminist belief
Today, I want to declare to the world that I belong to you.

So World, listen up - Julie belongs to Kelvin.

Our life, together, is moving forward every day as my belly grows bigger every day. I think our kid will appreciate a bitchy mom and a jackass dad, because we make a perfect pair.

Lucky you, little blueberry.

#happyanniversarytous
DearJulie

*Copain is the our favorite wine maker and that's what we served at our wedding and when we have dinner parties. And it is French, meaning someone to share the bread with. I was not making it up.

Nursery project

We have about 10 - 14 weeks to set up the nursery before little blueberry arrives. I know it's a bit late in the game but hey, at least I started reading Baby Bargains to get myself educated first. This is not an easy read. The book is thicker than I thought and I have been so reluctant to start because I did not want to be sucked into the world of baby shopping. If it sounds crazy that's because it is crazy.

How do you balance functionality, safety, budget, style/look, and eco-friendly production? I have no idea. But what's important to me is definitely the style/look. Heck yeah. This is not about being superficial; this is about being DearJulie.

We went to a couple local stores including Sprout and Giggle just to see what are out there. Any business model that's established on targeting women, is a good business. Same thing goes to the baby industry. They jack up the price by giving moms (women) some bullshit reasons such as, organic, whole natural wood, and non-allergen, and those suckers are really willing pay for the whopping price tags. Not that organic, whole natural wood, and non-allergen are wrong, but the mark-ups are. Nevertheless, it's Manhattan. People expect you to be able to afford.

I refuse to become one of those suckers.

This wonderful Baby Bargains book magically talks highly of IKEA stuff which makes me and my wallet very happy. Without going against my style principle, we decide to take a look at IKEA this coming weekend. At least to make comparison of products and take notes of what are good and bad. I will report back.

To remind you, the above is only for crib shopping. There are still other big ticket items such as stroller(s), drawers/changing tables, and maybe a wardrobe. Oh, and don't forget a nursery glider, which is really the extra extra mulas people pay for comfort. And because I am such a selfish person, that's one thing I am more willing to spend money on than others.

I have been playing with my nursery inspiration board and I absolutely love the style I am going with. Now, it's shopping time. No, I actually don't love shopping, it's stressful, but it has to be done.


#nurseryshopping
DearJulie


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Weekend workout:
Sat
Cardio Sculpt: 45 minutes
Incline bicep curl: 3x10
Cable curl: 3x10
Shoulders pull-down: 3x10
Lat extension: 4x10

Sun
Cycling: 45 minutes
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Confinement

Ancient wisdom always somehow survives the test generation after generation. Of all the weird or bizarre Chinese traditions or even superstitions, the postpartum confinement after giving birth or "sit the month" is what I deeply believe it.

Actually, let me slightly correct myself - I deeply believe in the concept, not so much the entire practice, if you know what the entire practice entails.

I grew up helping my grandma and my mom prep the confinement meals for my 4 uncles' wives, watched them go through that month with all the things that they were not allowed to do.  Of course, being in a traditional family like ours, these daughter-in-laws dared not to disobey. All of them really followed the instructions of not washing hair, not showering, not being exposed to cold air, not leaving the house, not drinking water (but rice wine) and lying in bed all day.

My mom volunteered to help me sit the month and offered to buy all the Chinese herbal medicine so that she could make all the "drinks" for me. She was going to cook too but I found a lady from Taiwan who lives in Queens who prepares confinement meals for 30 days based on different stages of postpartum needs during the month. She also delivers to your doorsteps so it works out for us. I recently had a tasting and it was actually pretty good - the black bone chicken soup, the beef soup with some kind of roots, and so on, were all pretty delish.

Regardless the fact that I know for sure I will sit the month, I still couldn't quite convince myself to do exactly what my mom will tell me to do and not do. Not leaving the house alone will drive me crazy enough. And then my sent me a document listing all the things NOT to do.

I was horrified.

I could not believe what I was reading and I could not believe that my mom wanted me to do all that. Now, I am reconsidering having my mom over for that month, because I think we will get into argument every frigging day and that would totally defeat the purpose of me resting. I am not sure if I can deal with her.

She said to me "why don't you just listen to me for once in your life?".

But if I already never listen to you, why would I even do now?
The document was in Chinese and let me just highlight several things on the list for you so you get an idea how an suffer it will be for me.

- Drink less water: because water makes you bloated and it expands your stomach.

- Rest: the mom should be guarded by the mom-in-law, the husband, the relatives to make sure she does not leave room.

-Lie flat for 2 weeks straight: standing up will cause the shifting of organs owing to the gravity. And also, wear a belly band.

- No washing hair because that causes the opening of the pores which let in the cold air which will lead to headache.

- No showering or bathing for the first 2 weeks, showering is allowed starting the 3rd week. Same idea to the above.

- Never ever use cold water, not even brushing teeth and washing face.

- When absolutely have to walk outside, cover every inch of the skin. Nothing can be exposed to the cold air.

- No holding the baby: the mom's body is the weakest and fragile after giving birth. Not holding the baby is the same idea of not lifting anything heavy. It will cause muscle pain and back pain.

- No lifting, no climbing stairs. no crying/tearing, no watching TV/reading books.

Now, you tell me, would you be able to live like that for one month? I know I couldn't.


#fucksitthemonth
DearJulie


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Cycling: 45 minutes
upper body workouts (update later)
lower body workouts (update later)
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Bad influence

In this phase, my little blueberry can sense the world with me - he can hear sound (us talking, music, noise and TV), sense the light, and taste flavors.

This worries me, because I can be a bad influence.

For example, I got some potty mouth, well, sometimes. I will curse the stupid drivers and just stupid people in general. Unfortunately they are everywhere and I don't seem to avoid them. Also, I say mean things. The other day, I said to a guy who kept dropping weights at the gym that what he did was very annoying and it was also scaring me and my belly.

I worry that I watch too much TV. Not that I have a lot of time to watch TV, but when I go through the DVR'ed shows, I just couldn't help finishing them all at once. To be honest, I don't watch very intellectuall shows, like say, shows on Discovery Channel, National Geographic Channel or History Channel, no they bore me or I should say, I haven't found any interesting subject that keeps my attention span. The most intellectual show that I have watched religiously recently was probably The Newsroom, and I think blueberry likes it too. Among all trash TV shows I watch, Royal Pain, White Collar, Suit, Covet Affairs, Necessary Roughness, to name a few, are my favorite. But maybe Royal Pain is not all so bad because blueberry can learn medical knowledge and be influenced in case he wants to be a doctor in the future. I'd say, if he really wanted to become a doctor, a concierge doctor would be actually a pretty good career path.

We try not to watch a lot of TV and decide that we will never let TV raise our kid. However, it's getting very hard especially during football season, which is like almost half of a year. For that, we have not figured out a solution.

To balance things a little, WQXR (the NYC local classical music station) is always on during the day since the moment we wake up, and blueberry likes it too. It also has a lot of calming effect on me while I am working in the office, so win-win! We even have the classical music station on when TB plays video games.

When it comes to the part where baby can listen to us talk, I do try talking to him a lot even though it's kindda odd talking to the belly. I did that at the supermarket and got curious eyes because I totally got carried away. When TB and I talk, I guess we just talk normally.

Sometimes if my sweet TB is annoying me, I'd do nothing to him but said to my belly "Daddy is really annoying right now and mommy does not like it. Don't grow up like daddy OK?" or, "Daddy just said What The Fuck. " It really works, because TB would leave me alone right away.

In terms of developing blueberry's taste buds, you can trust that I eat everything I love and I am really hoping my kid will love it too, especially anything that's spicy and sour. As I am helping him develop the taste buds, I am hoping he is not a picky eater because I am not. One thing for sure is that my diet is more Chinese than American and he is already eating all kinds of Chinese veggies.

However what I am not quite sure is that, whenever he kicks or moves because certain things I do, I can't tell whether he likes it or he protests it.

There are a lot of myths regarding how fetus' brain develop in the womb, but there are also a lot of science. I learn that all the "belly devices" to strapped on to the belly with music and sound to develop baby's sense of rhythm or what not, do not work. Glad I didn't spend the money. However, it is very important to provide a soothing and calming environment for baby to grow in the womb. That said, I need to keep calm and cool.


#babybrainrules
DearJulie


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Workout of the day
Squat: 3x10
Deadlift: 3x10
Sitted Good Morning: 4x15
Cycling: 45 minutes
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