three

today is our three year anniversary. i feel blessed to have married such a sound and steady man as tommy. i had the opportunity to chat with him online using webcams a few times this past week, and it was a lot of fun. of course, he keeps wanted to see my belly and commenting on how big it's getting. and i just want to see him smile.

it's been a challenging three years, to be honest, primarily because his job. this is our third deployment since we got married, and it doesn't seem to be getting any easier for either of us. i miss him more now than ever. i wish he was here to feel the baby move and help with the preparations. i wish he was here...just to have him here. i hate going to bed and waking up alone. even the dogs don't like to sleep in his spot. we're saving it for him.

hopefully the next few month will go quickly, and i'm praying he'll be home in time for Christmas. we've missed every one of our birthdays and anniversaries, and i know he won't be home for the baby's arrival, but i'm not prepared to give up Christmas this year, too.

i love you, thomas j. i hope you get a chance to call today, but if not, i know we'll talk soon. can't wait to see you again in a few months. happy anniversary.

feeling chuffed!

it's hard to shake the underlying sadness of missing my husband every day, but on days like today, at least it's easy to distract myself!

i got a new shipment of oldnavy.com maternity clothes in today. fabulous! i loved every single peice and only have to exchange two camisoles for largers sizes. (a medium shirt i can do, a medium camisole i can not!) i also stopped by Proud to be Pregnant, a little boutique in Bury St Edmunds specializing in maternity clothes and FINALLY found the perfect bra! this has seriousy been an agonizing search, and i was so excited when i found it that i bought two! hooray for new clothes and finding great bras!

then i picked up some cherries and stawberries from the market. seriously, summer is the best time to be a fruit lover! mm! i love LOVE cherries. it makes me so happy when they are in season.

and then i drove home on the A134 with my windows down, blasting BBC Radio 1, which was playing great music this afternoon! great radio days are like receiving an unexpected package in the mail - you just feel like the luckiest person in the world to hear a string of songs you'd love to sing at the top of your lungs. i've really been bitten by the British pop rock music bug. i'm loving the Fratellis, the Kieser Chiefs, and the Halloways among others.

took the dogs for a walk this afternoon. the walks are getting shorter and shorter. we only went for a half hour, and i was exhausted by the end! i guess the fact that i had been walking around Bury St Edmunds all afternoon in the sun may have contributed. but there was a day when an hour-long walk was nothing. the strangest thing is that the longer i walk, the weirder my belly feels. it's like towards the end, the baby settles right to the front of my belly, almost pressing outward, which is such a strange sensation. by that point, all i want to do is sit down!

then i finished the day off with a freezer pop! i haven't had one in years and bought a box the other week. snipped off the top and enjoyed a watermelon freezer pop. they are even better than i remember! and only 25 calories! :)

okay, i need to go paint my toenails so i can show them off in my new old navy sandals! have a great weekend!

A boy!

I had another ultrasound today, which went really well. It was actually quite relaxing, and I was tempted to fall asleep more than once! It was such a quiet and dark room. It made me think I should be getting a massage, not an ultrasound!

Mm. Massage. I should get one of those soon!

Anyway, back to the subject at hand. According to the technician, we're having a boy! She showed me his little wee wee (although, to be honest, it could have been anything to me. I mean, I could see it when she pointed it out, but I would have never found it on my own! I guess that's why she's the expert!)

He opened and closed his mouth a few times, moved his arms around a bit, and even looked us right in the eye! The technician capture a great shot of his face where you can actually see his eye looking straight ahead! Even crazier was seeing the eye move around on the screen, as if he was looking around, wondering, "What on earth is pressing on my head and rolling all around me right now?!"

I had a chance to talk to my husband this evening. Hooray! He's very excited about the boy. I guess it's a good thing it turned out to be a boy, becuase we really had no good girls names picked out! And Tommy has a huge list of boys names. Now to narrow them down!

my baby's daddy

the real title of this blog is Why My Husband Is Going to Make a Great Dad.

my baby is most active on the drive home from work. i rarely feel him/her move on the drive to work or even at work. but the half hour drive home affords lots of time to think and to enjoy these funny little twitches in my belly. the more the baby moves, the more i can't wait to hold it and see what he or she will look like.

on the drive home tonight, i was missing my husband but thinking about what an awesome dad he'll be. so i got to thinking about all the reasons i know he'll be a fantastic father. i have a sneaking suspicion he'll be more of a natural at parenting than i will, much like he is with cooking. and i know it's totally self-indulgent to brag on my husband, but if self-indulgent isn't the primary ingredient for a blog, then i don't know what is.

so here it is. the reasons tommy is going to make a fantastic father. he'll probably kill me for this.

1.) he's so affectionate with our dogs. if he's this affectionate with a dog, i can't imagine how much more so he will be with his own child.

2.) he's got a secret silly side. it's my favorite, favorite thing about him because it's so rare and so few people get to truly experience the depths of his goofiness. but i know that a baby will bring it out to its fullest. and what kid doesn't want a dad that can truly get down and get goofy?

3.) he's very generous. i'm constantly in awe at how much he truly enjoys giving to people. don't get me wrong, he loves to have things, but he loves to share them just as much. i know he'll do more than just provide for his family, he'll go out of his way to try and give us what we need and more. he's the best gift giver i've met.

4.) he so good at bringing out the best in people. i can't wait until he's an NCO because i truly beleive he'll be great at leading people. he recognizes potential in people and really tries to make a way for them to succeed. he'll be that kind of dad that believes his kids could hang the moon if they wanted to.

5.) he's always wanted to be a father. in fact, it quite frightened me when we weren't really even dating and he was talking about his family plans! but he's got such a desire to be a great father and provide a great childhood for his kids. i've said it before, but if it were up to him, we would have had two kids by now! i can't wait to see him live this dream.

there are plenty more reasons why i think Tommy is born to be a great dad, but these are the first that come to mind. i can't wait till he comes home to me and the baby and we can enjoy our life as a family together!

good news

good news, friends. baby Kaz was particularly active (the first time i've felt him/her since the other day) while i was listening to Beyonce and Jay-Z singing crazy in love.

there i was, driving home from work in miserable friday traffic, and i finally found a good song the radio. (seriously, fridays are the worst days for radio here. i hate driving home, and it always takes a good ten minutes longer than the other days! not to mention monday is a british bank holiday, so everyone is out on the roads, trying to get somewhere cool.)

so i started bopping around to Crazy in Love, wondering what our baby will be like and hoping i'll be a good mom. then baby just started moving around and rockin' along! i know it's super dorky, but i was so thrilled. i can't wait to meet this little booger and dance around with him/her!

should find out the sex of the baby at the end of this month. ee!!

movement

I felt the baby move for the first time last night! At least, it's the first time I can really say, "Yeah, that was definitely baby and not my imagination." And it felt nothing like a fluttering or quickening I had been expecting from all my baby books.

It felt like my heart was beating in my uterus! Suddenly there was a little thump. And a moment later, another one. It was crazy and strange and exciting! I put my hand down on my lower belly, and I could feel it, feel this little person inside of me doing...who knows what? Kicking? Stretching? Raising the roof?

To be honest, I've wondered if I felt the baby move before, but I've never been sure. Is it baby, or is it gas? Many times, physical manifestations confirmed the latter. My tummy is always gurgling, so I was never quite sure. But last night, there was no mistaking that this baby was awake and ready to rumble.

I left a voicemail for Tommy to let him know and he called a little later. It was fun to share it with him, but not nearly as much fun as it would be in real life, I'm sure.

Had a good day yesterday. Feeling a little more sad today, although I'm not nearly as bad as I was on Wednesday. It comes and goes. I'm looking forward to a day when these hormones even out and my emotions aren't so close to the surface they feel ready to rupture at any moment. Have a feeling it'll probably get worse before it gets better, though...

I've haven't forgotten about this place!

Sorry it's been so long since I've updated this! I'd use the excuse that I'm busy, but that's not really true. Lazy is more like it!

I'm not really sure if anyone is reading this or not, and if you are I assume you alread know the two biggest news items in my life right now. A) I'm 17 weeks pregnant with our first child. B.) Tommy just left last week for another deployment to Iraq. (I can't ebelive it's only been a week. It feels like a month already! Ugh.)

On the deployment front, Tommy is doing well. Technivally he's in the states (NM to be exact) for training right now and will see the sand sometime next month. I have my good days and bad days, but work keeps my mind off of the loneliness for now. Zeus is taking it harder this time than on previous deployments. Some nights he just stands by the front door and whines. Both dogs get SO excited when they see a man in BDUs (battle dress uniform - the brown and green camoflauge uniform Tommy usually wears to work.)

On the pregnancy front, it seems to being going well so far! We've heard the baby's heartbeat twice already and will have another ultrasound at the end of May, which will hopefully tell us the baby's sex! I'm feeling pretty good. I'm tired and sleep a lot, but my morning sickness is only about once or twice a week, so I can't really complain. I'm just starting to show, which is fun. In fact, today I'm weraing a maternity top and jeans!

Other than that, I'm doing well. Went to Cambridge today with a friend. W were hoping to hit Babys'R'Us, but they have closed it to remodel it into a Toys'R'Us, which is a little disappointing. But we did check out the mall, which helped to eas some homesickness! I bought a cute maternity top at Mothercare. Yay!

Still waiting to feel baby movements. I'll let you know when it happens!

Hey, if anyone is reading this, let me know! I'm just trying to decide if I'm giong to keep up with it or not. If it's only mom reading, I'll just call her with updates! Thanks! :)

mangoes in the market

It's a beautiful day in Thetford. Tommy and I went downtown and visited the market for the first time. I bought mangoes and raspberries. We then strolled around downtown Thetford, stopping in shops and looking in windows.

It's really one of the first nice days we've had on a weekend since we've been here. In fact, it's so nice, I decided to finally venture outside of our little neighborhood and go exploring down the main road by our house while I walked the dogs. It was a nice, long walk.

It felt great just to be out of the house and moving. I haven't gotten much exercise since I got here, so it was nice. The dogs LOVED it. They wanted to stop and sniff every little thing. I even found a nice pub up the road that serves food and has a nice patio with outdoor seating. Maybe we'll grab a bite soon.

Anyway, I just love days like today where you are genuinely able to enjoy the weekend. Sure, I have things to do, but nothing pressing, nowhere to be. And I love the first few days in spring that really feel like spring. We've had a few, but I've only been able to see them outside the window from work. But these early spring days always make me feel like a part of me that has been slumbering all winter is waking up again.

I'm excited to spend my first spring and summer in the UK, even without air conditioning. We're really settled into our house now, our internet and phone are finally working, I found a decent job. It's starting to feel like we're really living our lives again.

I see London...

We spent the day in London yesterday. It was a fun trip, but a cold day. The temperatures were in the low forties, and there was a wind whipping through the city that made things much colder. Other that dreary weather, though, it was a good day. We saw Big Ben, Parliament, the London Eye (that huge ferris wheel), Westminster Abbey and Buckingham Palace. We were going to try and make to the London Bridge, but we were exhausted and the weather didn't look promising. (Sure enough, it began to rain as we left the city.)



Westminster Abbey was my favorite stop. It's so huge and sprawling, and the architecture is amazing! I've seen European cathedrals before, but this one just kept going and going and going! There were chapels and chapels full of tombs of deceased kings, queens and other British notables (including Geoffrey Chaucer and Charles Dickens!) It's just amazing to walk through a building so steeped in history. It is the site of the coronations of all British royals since King Edward I (I think.) He commissioned a coronation throne in 1297 that is still used to this day in coronation ceremonies. 1297!



We drove into the outskirts of London and then took the underground into London proper. Since the Victoria line was closed from Blackhorse station to Kings Cross station, we had to take a bus to get to the train. And the other lines were pretty packed. We did a lot of standing. Despite the face that it's winter and their is less BO in the air, I'm pretty sure someone farted on every train and bus we took. Seriously! Who thinks it's okay to do that in such cramped quarters?!

Anyway, it was a good trip. Hopefully we can go again soon when it's a bit warmer. There's still so much I want to see! We'd like to see a play at some point. (Currently Ashlee Simpson is starring in "Chicago." Huh. And Daniel Radcliff of Harry Potter fame is in some play where he's nude! Aaiiee!!) And we're hoping to take a weekend trip to Bath and Stonehenge soon. Can't wait!!

Employed

I have been blessed with gainful employment recently! As much as I hate getting up early in the mornings and facing the A11 (the highway between Thetford and...well, everything else) during rush hour, it's nice to have a job. More than anything, it's nice to know I'll be getting a paycheck again soon! This is the longest I've ever gone unemployed (nearly three months.) I'm ready to have some fun money again!

I'm working as a teller for a financial institution on RAF Lakenheath (the other USAF base about three miles from RAF Mildenhall, where we are stationed.) So far, I'm pretty excited about the job! I've been working for three days now, and I think it will be a good fit with my personality. I'll be done training at the end of this week, and then onto the teller line! Wish me luck! :)