I've spent the past two days painting the nursery. Wendy (wonderful gal that she is) came all the way out to Putzbrunn on Thursday in the sweltering heat and drove me to Obi for paint. They have this wonderfully expensive base paint, costs like 32 Euros for 5 liters. And they have paint chips. Not like the American ones with 5 different tones of one color on a strip but with one main color and then three smaller totally different colors beneath it on a big round rack. I searched high and low until I found the section with purples. There were two I really liked, Wendy didn't help, she just stood back and agreed that everything was lovely, so it was up to me to choose between them and I went for the warmer lavender. It has more pink undertones and the other had more blue.

You then take your little paintchip up to the counter (where of course no one is waiting to help you) and give them the chip and show the color you want. The woman who finally came to help us proceeded to ask me how big the room was. Now, Sven and I had measured it out the weekend before and decided on 18 square meters so I rounded it up to 20, thinking I had it down. The woman then asks me "living space or wall space?" and I was stumped. It makes more sense, writing it out in English, but at the time I had no idea what she wanted from me and finally told her that we had measured each wall from top to bottom and side-to-side and come up with 20 square meters. Apparently, this is a funky mass. You can buy 2.5 liters or 5 liters of paint, 2.5 would be too little, 5 too much. She seemed to think I'd change my mind or something, so I just said, 'better too much than too little' and she set up the computer to mix the paint for me.

Wonderful Wendy offered to lug the heavy thing and proceeded to get paint all over her shirt. I felt soooooo bad!

On Friday, I got down and dirty. Jessica made me a lovely apron 2 years ago for Christmas, it's purple and has big pockets in the front and ties in the back, so I put it on with an older pair of shorts, covered the floor in plastic and taped up the walls and started painting, only to discover that the tray I bought for the roller was too narrow. Oops. That made painting difficult, besides which, I've never painted before anyway!

Spent most of the day Friday painting and when Sven came home all he said was: and you like this? Hmph.

Had him go in and look it over this morning and help me find bad spots that I then did my best to touch up, including painting white back over the smears I got on the ceiling despite taping. By mid-afternoon I was able to clean up the room and move the bookcases back up near the wall (but not against yet) and took a photo:

The big empty space to the left is where the closet will go. So now the painting is done and I love, absolutely LOVE it. That purple makes me happy. Makes me smile. Sven isn't so sure about it and Mom was trying to convince me to stick with green, but I just love that purple! And painting is tough work. My hands hurt and I actually slept almost ten hours yesterday after, and took a nap this afternoon as well! Someone else can paint the room white again when we move out!

So the other thing that happened this morning was that I woke up to a thread at 2 Peas for the 'pregnant pubsters' to share belly shots. I don't have any belly shots and didn't want any, because I've just felt like a whale, but seeing all those girls and their cute bellies got me a bit envious. Then I changed clothes to walk to Aldi and put on this lovely green shirt from Mom and realized that with a nice shirt and standing in provile, I don't look quite as much like a whale as I feel. So I had Sven take some shots when we got back from Aldi and I had him do it in the nursery so we could get shots with the purple wall at the same time.

It is truly amazing what you can do with Photoshop to make your ugly self look lovely and glowy, isn't it? I was proud of myself for removing the huge shadow and was showing Sven, but all he saw was that I had fixed-up my face and skin to give it a healthy (or in his opinion, fake) glow.

So there it is folks, G and me at 24 Weeks.

ETA: if you are curious as to how the nursery is shaping up, just compare the above photo with the one I took back in March under: Room design & peanut butter.

With the relative success of yesterday's button hole experience, I thought it would be cool to get down and dirty and sew something real, I mean, isn't that why I bought the sewing machine two years ago? So I started perusing the net to get an idea of patterns, especially easy-to-sew children's patterns. Well, besides not finding anything that caught my eye at a quick glance, I was apalled at the prices. How in the world can anyone justify spending $10 on a pattern, plus the cost of fabric, plus the time and energy (and in my case, stress) spent creating the pattern once you've bought all the supplies? In the end, you've spent more time, energy and money making the outfit than if you had bought it in the first place.

So much for sewing children's clothing. I would still love to use my sewing maching for something other than the occasional button hole or border on a layout, so if any sewing readers out there have tips or suggestions or patterns, especially for a clueless beginner, I'm all eyes and ready to give it a go!

On a totally unrelated note, I've been meaning to snap a photo of this for a week or so, having finally received all the supplies in order to do the organizing, but only just cleaned up the mess of my scrap area this past weekend. The idea for ribbon storage came when I asked how others store their non-spooled ribbon. Kim suggested paper towel tubes, which I had tried and didn't like, until I tried her suggestino of using straight pins to secure the ribbon. Now that worked much better, but the number of tubes was (still is) getting out of hand:

Obviously, despite all other attemps at organization, I still have tubes of ribbon hanging around. Would LOVE to get some sort of board with dowels and hang them off of that, now that would look cool. Maybe I can find something when I go to the Baumarkt later this week? Then I can hang the spools I have as well.

Okay, but this is not all of my ribbon, and I didn't want to keep collecting tubes, so was looking for another suggestion. That's how Renée comes into the picture. She shared a link someone had posted at Luv 2 Scrapbook and it looked so cool, I had to get the Cropper Hopper stuff myself. It took over a month to get all the supplies. The embellishment case came first, and no embellishment boxes. So the case sat around for weeks and weeks while I waited for the boxes to arrive. Both case and boxes landed at customs and I had to pay tax on them. I don't know why. When Luv 2 Scrapbook sends me paper, it never goes through customs, despite the prices being much higher!

Can you blame me for wanting to try out this system myself? I mean, how cool is it, anyway? So this is mine. Only it turns out, 90 embellishment boxes aren't enough to store all of my ribbon, which is why I still have 4 tubes of ribbons and two plastic boxes of ribbons and twill, and two cards of unopened ribbon and all the spools in addition to the featured ribbon storage. It almost makes me want to sit down and scrap with only ribbon in order to get rid of some and free up space! (Yes, I hoard supplies. The thought of using something and then NOT HAVING IT ANYMORE is too horrible to deal with!) Maybe it's not such a bad idea that there were no KI Sashes for preorder with the two new sets at Luv 2 Scrapbook...

And one last scrapbook-related note. Last month, Tracy shared a really cool baby album she made for her daughter's teacher. Not exactly an album, it's more of a 'Baby's First Book'. I loved it so much (okay, still love it) that I emailed her right away and begged for complete details. Her response was to send me a few (understatement of the month) goodies to get me started and I finally sat down and made my own album this past weekend. It's missing a few pages at the beginning, and the actual album (that's coming in a few weeks) but otherwise, it's done and I love it, and I thank you Tracy, for the inspiration!!!

There's no point in sharing mine though, it's mostly exactly like Tracy's. The joy of copying, leaves you free to just enjoy scrapping without the stress of what to do next.

I did it! I sewed a button hole! Not just one, in fact, I sewed six! Yah, I had some disasters before I got it working right. Turns out sewing mumbo-jumbo in German was too much for me and I didn't have half an idea what I was supposed to do. Major step involved removing the 'foot' (which I think is 'pedal' in English) and attaching the special button hole 'foot'. Um. Okay, found the special button hole foot, and played with levers until I figured out how to remove the current foot. Yah. Taking things apart is always easier than putting them back together...Obviously I figuerd it out (see above photo of attached button hole foot).

Then I practiced. Pulled out my old pajama bottoms, for the first go. When it bombed, I figured the material was too thin and so dug into the give-away sack (that's been hanging out to be given away since oh, January...) and pulled out an old shirt. Perfect, it already had button holes, so I knew it had to work. First attempt bombed. I nearly sewed a huge hole right into the shirt. Oops. I stopped and read the directions all over again. Turns out, there is this little lever that you literally have to pull DOWN. The lever says 'push'. How was I to know you have to pull it, when it says 'push'?! So I pulled. Success!

Okay. I was ready to attempt my actual shirt. The shirt is pink, sort of hot pink. I didn't have any thread that color, so went for red. No red bobbins, so I had to wind a new bobbin as well. Forgot how fun it is to wind bobbins and accidentally filled up the whole thing. Oops.

Sewed my first real button hole, got all ecited, went to slit it and despite being quite handy with an exacto knife and paper, I slit right through the button hole's stitching. Got out a needle and did my best to repair. We'll see how it holds up!

So, I did much better on the next hole and was very careful about slicing it. I'm wearing the shirt now, the straps are still a bit loose, but though they threaten to fall off my shoulders, they are holding up pretty well.

Moved on to shirt number 2 (these are smocked tanks with button-straps for the custom-fit, and I have 3 - thanks mom!). This shirt is a salmon-orange. Nope, no thread that color either, nothing even close, so I kept the red on there. My first hole went like a charm. Second hole bombed. I still don't know what happened except it was reminiscent of my first attempt which left a gouging hole in the material. Got the stitching out, tried again. Success.

Shirt number three. Blue this time, so I had to change the thread and the bobbin. I had to wind another bobbin, this time, despite the fun, I stopped. stiched, and voila!

Obviously, the far right is my button hole. Yes, a bit off-center with the other two, but it works. Did my best on this shirt. One would hope, since I'd already done it five times by then!

I can sew a button hole!

This is big news, check this out:

Why is this big news? Because this is a real live, American-Style Rocking Chair!!! And it is for sale in Germany! It's at Otto and I swear 2 years ago the had NO SUCH THING. I want it. I want it bad. I've always, always wanted a rocking chair, and it's Mom's fault. I love hers. When I visited Kylene for the first time and saw her rocking chair, I was so jealous. I mean really, really, jealous. Not only does she have a fabulous rocking chair, she has a hope chest. I had about resigned myself to the fact that I will never have a real rocking chair and was bemoaning the fact to Kerry when I did a search (on a whim) to prove to her that there really aren't any in Germany and what did I find?!

So here't the thing though, i have to convince someone that I really need to have it, and asap, because it takes 8 weeks to be delivered. So if I can order it today, then I'll get it mid-August. That's still good. Mid-August is perfect, by then, the nursery should be pretty much put together, painted, bed and closet bought and assembled, etc. So keep your fingers crossed for me, okay?

Now, since we're on the subject...let me share a few other things I have in mind for the nursery. Germany doesn't have fun nursery sets, Germany has very GERMAN nursery sets. That's fine, I am in Germany, it's just tough when I see examples of what Lisa is considering buying. For one thing, the pink is just to die for, especially the set from the Gap. For another thing, look at that darling sample sleigh-style crib! Yah. Gorgeous. This is similar to what I am (eventually) getting:

I wonder if it can be painted white? Anyway, this is the small-sized crib at Ikea, the have one that looks exactly the same, but is bigger. This one is 117cm long. I have to decide between this one for €29,95 at Ikea, or practically the same bed at Babywalz or Babys-R-Us. The difference is that those are 120cm long. My crib set is American-Standard. about 9 cms too long, so it is going to take some squishing to fit it all in. (The bedding is Classic Pooh. It was being sold at Babys-R-Us two years ago and I bought it for Zane).

And then there is the changing table. Yes, I've been convinced. I decided I'd rather drag the table into the kitchen or bathroom and put the baby tub on top so i don't have to do the bathing on my knees. Kereth wants to BUY ME this one:

and when someone is seriously gifting you, how can you say no?! However, Simple as it is, I wish it had a shelf at the bottom for storage. So I'm wondering whether this one might not be better (plus, it has wheels!):

So what do you think? the one with two shelves and wheels, or the really cheap simple one from Ikea? I can probably paint the one from Ikea white, I doubt I can paint this one from Babywalz, which would make it the only bit of non-white furniture in the room.

On a non-baby related note, I got my shoes from Land's End today (thanks Kerry!!!) and so far they are terribly comfortable. I need to test wear them on a long walking-day to know for sure, but am hoping they'll be perfect for Crete. They might be a bit big, but a size down would be a bit tight. So on the big side they stay. Besides, my feet are bound to swell if it ever actually gets hot, right?

And Kylene, if you are reading, I finally finished de-decoupaging that wooden box. I used a sponge and scrubbed and made a mess and it took forever and was exhausting. The box is now drying and awaiting its fate. Should i paint it purple for G's room and use it as storage? Or since it would up against a purple wall, should i paint it white? Or should I use it for my scrap-area for storing supplies? Decisions, decisions. And I'd like nothing better right now, than to go to a Baumarkt and pick up the paint and supplies to paint G's room. Then I'd love to go to Ikea and order her closet. I can't wait for the closet. As soon as I have that, I can start putting all the clothing I have from Zane and for her, into some sort of order!

One last plug for the Rocking Chair: isn't it gorgeous?!

UPDATE! I just orderd the rocking chair. Yes, without consulting Sven or anyone else, because you know what I remembered? BHG refused to pay me for my last 3 layouts in dollars and sent me a check for euros. Now, the check isn't the complete €199 that the rocking chair costs, and once they take out the fee for foreign banks, I'll have to pay about €20 or €30 I'm guessing, plus shipping. But honestly, how can Sven say 'NO' to €30 as compared to €199?!

I was reading Summer's blog and she made a comment that totally made sense. She was talking about her son, Caden, and how some days he turns flips all day long and then he just sort of rests for a day or so. That is exactly what G does. She was so active on Wednesday I thought she'd never slow down, and never sleep! Then on Thursday, she was so quiet I started to worry. In fact, one of the few time she moved was in protest to her father using my stomach to push himself up. Um, ow! He must not have been thinking, I was half-asleep on the couch and he next to me, he'd put his head down near my stomach and since nothing was happening, pushed himself up again. That little push might be nothing when I'm not pregnant, but yesterady, it woke me out of my half-sleep and G kicked a couple times in protest. After which, she was again silent. She's still pretty quiet today, I'm hoping she just really tired herself out on Wednesday.

I've been spending (wasting?) too much time this week doing fruitless genealogy research. Everytime I think I've hit on a new clue, it's nothing. I even signed up for the free 14-day Trial at ancestery.com in the hopes I'd find something new. It soon became apparent that there is nothing new within the limited resources my Free Trial gave me. So I called this week to cancel my Free Trial Membership (and therefore my membership totally so I wouldn't be charged $200 at the end of it) and the lady wouldn't cancel me. She kept me on the phone for a long time (she won't have reailzed that the call was NOT free for me) and searched out a couple people for me. No, she didn't find anything new that Ihadn't already found. Thankfully, my Free Trial lasts until the 23rd, so I just have to call again next week and not take no for an answer. See, the thing is, the most extensive information I've hooked into to date, has been in the free area of ancestry.com. So why pay the full membership?

Continuing with Genealogy research. I actually started up with it back in 1999, before I'd even dreamed of scrapbooking. At that time, there was even less information online, but what there was, was more or less free for the reading/taking. Five years later, I return to the world of online genealogy searching, to discover mounds of new information, but all of it is locked behind paid memberships. And we're not talking $9.95 a pop, we're talking $99.95 or $129.99 or even $200! It's just not worth it. So I'm falling back on relatives. Maternal won't reply to my Emails and it turns out, paternal have letters from ancestors up on their walls at home. Why oh why do they have to live so far away in Texas where I can't get access to the letters? And for that matter, these letters are framed on the wall, so worried about fading into obvlivion before I can get copies of them.

I do hope to get back to Texas next year with Sven and G. Like to bring her to meet the grandparents (on both sides) while all are still there and in one place. Well, okay, Dallas and Kerrville aren't exactly one place, but closer than Arkansas and Texas, right?

Saturday: up early to catch the 10:15 bus and on to Marienplatz, and the Fischbrunnen to meet Liz. Surprise, it was Munich's 100th Birthday Festival. The place was packed. Found Liz anyhow and ended up at BurgerKing (wasn't planned, but whatever) and then on to Cinema for 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' and on the way passed another new Starbucks in the Sendlingerstr. Happy Day!

Ben & Jerry's at Cinema (decided I don't like oatmeal cookie) and then the movie. Absolutely hilarious. I love Douglas Adams, I love his humor, I love his essays, I love his books, the hitchhiker books and the Dirk Gently books. Probably the best part of the movie was the dolphins singing 'So Long and Thanks for all the Fish' (click on the link and have a listen, you'll be humming the tune for the rest of the day) and then jumping into space at the end. I dare you not to laugh!!

After the movie, we went back to the new Starbucks and I had a Strawberries & Créme Frappucino and Sven and Liz both had a Chocolate Créme Frappuccino (we didn't realize these are coffee-free, good for me, bad for Sven). Very yummy, although after peeking at the Starbucks website, I see there are even more flavors, I wonder if the one in Munich has the peppermint option? yum!

After Starbucks, both Liz and Sven needed to go to Saturn. I don't think Liz realized what she was getting herself in for. Saturn on Saturday is hell, that is all there is to it.

Back home again and die of exhaustion.

Sunday: refueled. Literally. Read all day long. Not even a new book, just rereading old stuff.

Monday: moved the closet out of the guest/nursery/spare/junk room into the computer room. Not sure why I decided to do that today, except I've been wanting to for months now. Got the thing emptied and put it on a big sheet of cardboard and started to slide it. Doorway from kitchen to nursery is too low. Okay, sipped the closet over so it was lying on its side. slid it through, no problem! Tried to continue sliding the closet through the kitchen, into the hall and on down to the computer room. No chance. There was no freaking WAY that closet was going to pass through those angles. I squeezed through the door a few times. Guess that's why I had to do this project now, a few more weeks and I never would have fit through the squeezy spaces! So. Backed up, got the closet back on its feet and slammed it into the slant in the kitchen (shhh, don't tell Sven!). Back on its sheet of cardboard and SLIDE. The doorway from the kitchen to the hall is higher, the closet fit, no problem.

Next issue, getting the closet from the main hallway into the 'T' where the main door is, and the computer room. This house was built SO well, that it not only has crooked walls and slanted floors, but the floor in the long hall to the 'T' hall is lower, so I had to lift the closet UP over the bump and in the process, hit a picture hard. the grass cracked into a zillion pieces. Nevermind, got the closet through and on into the computer room, in its nwe corner (it looks ridiculous, but whatever) and managed to scratch the floor when maneuvering it off its cardboard (again, don't tell Sven, maybe he won't notice!!) and FINALLY. Closet is in its new home.

Lots of vacuuming, floor scrubbing, and then built the last bookcase and man is it wobbly. not sure if it's just badly made, or whether its the uneven floor. Good thing it has a topple-protector!

By then, I was too tired to do anymore, so I had lunch.

Around 5 I was eating creamy peanut butter chocolate chips, (thanks to Renée for that suggestion...) AND peanut butter and crackers when the smell of the peanut butter decided me right then and there, to make peanut butter cookies. How convenient, that Jif has a recipe on the jar. Only ate two though, turns out, indigestion is bad today, and peanut butter cookies make it worse.

Exciting day, eh?

Yesterday was a turning-point doctor's visit. I slept badly (surely nerves) and was awakened 30 mins earlier than planned, amazing how that can throw you off. Sven wasn't coming with this time, as we had been told there would be no ultrasound. So I headed off alone for my 8:30am appointment.

New woman behind the reception counter. Not only that, she was alone, poor thing. I was shipped off to the bathroom immediately and shortly after to the lab for blood (iron check) and blood pressure (115, I think that's good?).

While I was sitting on the red chairs outside the lab, waiting for my turn in with Dr. T., I heard him arguing with the nurse on duty about my appointment. He was giving her hell for my chart which said: NO ULTRASOUND SCHEDULED. Poor woman kept saying, "but Frau Ring wrote it down specifically..." and Dr. T., kept going on about which week I'm at, and what does that mean...? I felt so bad for the poor woman, because I know for af act that Dr. T. told Frau Ring NO ULTRASOUND for the next appointment. Both Sven and I had heard him. That is why I was nervous yesterday, thinking I'd have to beg and then shell out the cash for the u/s myself!

Well, I got in and was sent immediately to the chair. It wasn't an extensive Ultrasound, just a quick check of the head and heart. I was so scared, couldn't see a thing because they'd left all the lights on and the shades open. Dr. T, suddenly says: "Why is it so bright in here?" and the nurse helping got up and darkened the room, at which point, G must have yawned. I missed it though, as the screen wasn't up on the ceiling and I was having trouble craning my neck to see the monitor. Dr. T., was in a good mood. He joked about her yawning as soon as the lights went out and continued with the exam. Everything is 100% okay. No excess water, heart looks good, chest looks good, and we were done.

Just for me, he got a close-up profile (to print out) and said blah blah blah NASAL BONE. I stared blankly at him and asked him to repeat himself. "Nasal bone". Silly man, talking in German the whole way through and then suddenly spouts off that one word in English. I had no idea what he was talking about! He then proceeded to joke about languages and how many they spoke, making fun of the nurse who speaks 'Frankisch' and then I was done. His cheerful mood was so what I needed. I was ready to break down when I heard all was okay. Now to get through July!

Now why this appointment was so damn frightening. Two years ago, on June 24th (Zane was a bit behind) in the 22nd week of pregnancy, Dr. T., discovered slight hydrocephalus in Zane's brain. Now, this can be nothing, it can be just that, hydrocephalus, which can be treated after birth, or in extreme rare cases, it can be the precursor to a tumor.

That day, Dr. T,. performed an amniocentesis immediately and I gave blood to check everything out. We left the offices nervous, but with no real idea what was happening. The same week we returned to the offices for the test results and learned they were negative. That was Momentary Relief. In response to the results, I created the following layout:

Journaling: They say, the worries start the moment you conceive…for me, they started on the first day of the 23rd week when the doctor told us something might be wrong, that you had too much fluid in your brain. That unexpected announcement took us by so much surprise we didn’t react until we’d returned home, 2.5 hours and an amniocentesis later. It might have been a bad idea, but I wanted to know just what we were looking at, so I pulled out the doctor’s report from my ‘mother-pass’ and read the dreaded words “leichtes hydrocephalus internus”. I suddenly feared for your life. Your Dad and I spent a very restless night, wondering, “what does this mean?”, “what is going to happen?” Followed by a tough day of waiting for the lab to call us with results. The hours slithered by with no phone call. By 7pm, we were both exhausted with waiting and worrying and no news. We’d given up on hearing anything by then. This morning we went back to the doctor to learn the worst, or best. The lab results arrived five minutes before my appointment due to an unexpected accident that had delayed the sample and the doctor received us with a smile, the chromosome test was normal. The worst is over, my worries however, have only just begun. We are still waiting for the blood results and I’m afraid, no matter what they tell us, until I hold you in my arms, I’ll be worrying for you, and until the day one of us is no longer in this world, I will continue to worry for you. That must be part of what a mother’s love is. You have my heart little one. (June 26 2003)

Is it now more obvious why I nearly broke down after hearing the good news? I'm still walking on ice, afraid to believe it's going to work this time...

I got "tagged" today by Wendy. It's a blog-thing apparently, called a meme. It looks like I am supposed to put the answer to the question in a google search and link the first thing that comes up. So I'll give it a try:

Where I grew up:

• Woodinville (that was 5th - 12th grades)
• Phoenix (2nd - 5th grades)
• Rio Rancho (BK - 1st Grades)

Where I live now: Putzbrunn

My Name: Amber

My grandma's name (paternal): Averlyne (I used google's cached site so that her name would be highlighted. Must admit, it surprised me to find her name online somewhere not having to do with my own research!!)

My favorite food: M&M's (that's like making me choose a favorite book, near impossible!!!)

My favorite drink: Apfelschorle

My favorite movie: The Princess Bride (it's a favorite movie, how can you choose just one?!)

My favorite smell: Jasmine (hmph, has nothing to do with the flower or the smell)

I'm tagging:
Abby
Amber
Ellen
Erin
Julie
Kerry
Lee Anne