The last Thanksgiving in which we get to eat without interruption or mashed potatoes being flung at our faces

I feel that it's only responsible, in the interest of full disclosure, to begin this post on Thanksgiving with the admission that I don't think my jeans are fitting very well. By jeans I mean my overpriced Citizens of Humanity maternity jeans and by "not fitting well" I mean my butt and/or thighs must be growing. Any suggestions for making black yoga pants look chic for the next two months? While we're at it, any suggestions for making anything look chic from this point on?

If my jeans are the casualty of our Thanksgiving day indulgences, so be it. Or, if I want to remain in denial (yes please!), I could go with my friend's suggestion that since I'm still going to the gym and doing squats and what not while carting around 25+ pounds on my belly, maybe I'm just getting quads of steel. That's what friends are for, right? Plausible means of denial.

We took advantage of this year's Thanksgiving as the last quiet one we'll have for... a while. All day we marveled that this time next year, our daughter (our daughter!!) will be eating turkey and mashed potatoes (and Bailey will be licking them off of the floor). Neither of us will have the privilege of sitting through our meal uninterrupted and we may or may not have mashed potatoes on our extremities as casualties of the cupcake's first Thanksgiving.

For this year, with no reason to even change out of pajamas (though we did, for the record, and one of us wore pants with a non-elastic waistband), we reveled in having the day completely to ourselves. Anil cooked a 10 pound turkey, made two kinds of stuffing (one is his mom's recipe which he swears by, and he made another batch for me sans giblets), green bean casserole, and two pumpkin pies. (What? Whole Foods only sells pie crust in sets of two.) We toasted with IPA and sparkling cider. While Anil cooked, I lounged in my giant-bellied glory on the couch, reading books and magazines. We watched movies, first as our feast roasted and then again as it digested. Anil even started the day off right for Bailey (because his days of being an only child are numbered and he deserved a relaxing day too) with a run, then a spa treatment--bath in the tub and nail trimming.

Here are some photos to document the labors of the day, or lack thereof in my case.

I love this photo of Anil starting the day because it shows how small our kitchen is! Notice that one hand is on the counter on one side while the other reaches in a drawer on the other--the kitchen is more narrow than Anil's wingspan.

Anil and Bailey both waited eagerly for the turkey to roast. I swear I didn't stage this.

Anil carving the turkey, mmmm...

Oh, and while all that work was going on in the kitchen? I was busy being a baby vessel... stretched out on the couch propping a magazine on my belly.

Finally, here is our feast. I cleared the table of mounds of baby gear so that we wouldn't have to eat on the coffee table in front of the TV; I did contribute. Dinner was simple and perfect.

I guess technically it was the baby's first Thanksgiving since she did get her share of it, but I'm sure she'll enjoy next year's much more. We'll enjoy next year's too, but in a very different way. So for now, I'm thankful for my amazing husband who literally functioned like an entire restaurant staff all day--doing all of the cooking and cleaning. I'm thankful for leftovers, then thankful for the neighborhood Italian place that we ate at tonight when we needed food that wasn't beige. I'm thankful that Whole Foods sells pie crusts in twosies so that we still have leftovers of orange, even if it threatens my designer maternity jeans. I'm just trying to remember to be thankful for this calm before the crazy baby storm, when even though I can't tie my shoes without my face turing red from lack of oxygen, I can still put my feet up and watch a movie and only have to get up every half hour because I have to pee, not because someone else did. We both relished having such a peaceful day together.

turkey time!

I just ordered a turkey from Whole Foods, for Anil and me (and Bailey), that is bigger than our baby will be at birth. It's about 10 pounds, which I need to assume is bigger than the baby will be; otherwise I might as well go ahead and schedule my c-section right now. We've been debating what to do for Thanksgiving and decided to just go ahead and overdo it, even though it's just the two of us (or three or four if you count the dog and baby... but can I mention here that "eating for two" really isn't even funny anymore because my stomach is being compressed by the baby's studio apartment). Anil wouldn't even hear of getting a turkey breast instead of a whole entire turkey, and for anyone who knows the size of our kitchen, you can only imagine what kind of adventure this will be.

Somewhat prepared childbirth

Anil and I spent all of Saturday at a childbirth class. If you’ve been a recipient of an email or text that I’ve sent containing the words “childbirth class” over the past week or so, I can almost guarantee that it was followed by the word, “Yikes!”

I was nervous. Excited, but also anxious because I figured the class would make this whole birth thing feel more real, and, to be honest, I was freaked out by the promised birth video. I was the one who put my head down during the 8^th grade viewing of “The Miracle of Life.” I was momentarily traumatized by that money shot of the baby crowning in “Knocked Up”. (Wasn’t everyone? In an interview on NPR Judd Apatow admitted that that was his intention—thoughtful of him.) I turn my head away from flu shots and from getting blood drawn, and I stay relatively relaxed as long as I can’t see what’s happening. I make denial work in my favor. When I give birth, it’s not like I’m going to have a front row seat visually speaking, if you know what I mean. I'm not writing a birth plan, but if I did it would begin with "No mirrors!"

Overall though, it was anticlimactic. We took the “prepared childbirth class” versus the “natural” one, as well as the one-day versus two or more, so we probably got the most condensed version, even at 6 hours. I should note here that no one does "Lamaze" classes anymore--I've had a few people ask if that's what this class was, and I always get this picture in my head of women from the 80s in leotards going "hee hee hoooooo". Lamaze is a kind of breathing that you can do if you want, to help you through contractions, but there are also a handful of other widely-used strategies, and there are other classes that emphasize them, especially if you're hoping for an unmedicated birth. This class was much more widely focused--we went over final stages of pregnancy, labor in its different stages, how you know it's really happening and when to head to the hospital (later than I thought--not till contractions are five minutes apart, so you can labor at home for hours before you have to trade those comfy Juicy maternity pants for a hospital gown), what you might bring, and very basic differences of natural and pain-managed childbirth. And the promised birth videos.

The videos did make me feel like I was in 8^th grade again, but mainly due to the snickering and eyebrow raising going on in the room. It was hard to take them seriously most of the time. Then again, the kind of women who volunteer to have cameras pointed at their hoo-has and have their labor and delivery filmed for posterity aren’t usually going to be ones you’d meet out for drinks. Seeing someone make a face during a contraction is not what I had in mind when I dropped my credit card for a birth class, nor was a post-birth interview with the happy couple about how it was all worth it—isn’t that what TLC’s “A Baby Story” is for? Or YouTube if you’re really adventurous. I took the class because I wanted something more interactive and dynamic than a book or video, so at times I was more annoyed than anxious when staring at the screen.

What was ultimately helpful, though, was the emphasis on teamwork, for lack of a better word. The class involved the “support person” every step of the way and emphasized how Anil will be able to help me through different stages of labor (best tip of the day: bring a toothbrush to the hospital so laboring woman won’t want to gauge your eyes out if you breath tuna sub in her face), and how he can be a part of everything, from start to finish—how his support, physically and emotionally, will actively help me through labor.

Anil knows all of the medical steps, and I had to hit his leg to get him to stop texting during the c-section video, but the way that the class tapped into his involvement was a nice surprise. He’s been working a lot lately, and feeling frustrated that he can’t do anything to ease the pain in my ribcage at night when he does happen to be home, and let’s face it—he’s not the one with physical symptoms that demand he slow down his lifestyle but he still has to negotiate the changes in mine, so I think he’s felt like too much of a bystander lately, because nothing’s really changed for him yet except me. And since we don’t have the kind of schedule where we get home from work and cook dinner together or spend Saturdays at the movies or something reassuringly routine like that, it’s been hard to connect from two different places lately, beyond being task-oriented in errands like The Container Store (oooh romantic!) or complaining about how we’re bored by this season of “Heroes” that’s backing up on our DVR when we have a day or night off together.

In one video, however, it’s suggested that you take a walk during early labor. A fine idea (if you aren’t due in Jan/Feb in Boston), until the man remarks, “Taking a walk was really relaxing for me.” Really? Really?! Because your lower half wasn’t trying to secede from your torso. I get that the guy can be nervous at the onset of labor too, but please. Maybe that will give us something to laugh about when I am in labor, and that’s a good coping strategy to hang onto. I also hope they don't try to present my placenta like a tray of brownies; the instructor swore that was just for the video.

After the class, we kept the good vibe going by getting take-out Indian food and watching "Away We Go." And making and eating an almost entire batch of cookies. Go teamwork!

baby shower extravaganza!

In the midst of all this complaining and “life is changing” blah blah blah soul searching, I do want to take time to go back and write about how wonderful our baby showers have been, and how they’ve made both Anil and me more excited for what’s to come and so appreciative of our friends and family that are along for the ride with us.

[I should note here that I’m writing this in Starbucks, with my laptop on my legs and my iphone resting on my belly (and when the baby moves, the phone moves)… I am that pregnant woman. I’m also wearing stretchy pants. And I ate a huge pumpkin scone then had to wipe the crumbs off my belly. Just wanted to give you that mental picture.]

At the end of October Anil and I flew to Virginia for the weekend for two baby showers—one with my extended family in Richmond, then one with our friends in Charlottesville. Since we won’t be making it back there for any holidays this year, I was so looking forward to seeing the army of women that make up my family in Virginia. Most holidays for us look like bridal or baby showers just based on the sheer concentration of estrogen, with a smattering of boys and men here and there. My mom's two sisters also came, from opposite sides of Virginia (Maryland and North Carolina), so that was also a treat. The bummer was that my cousin who’s in college wasn’t going to be able to make it, so I was sad to not get to see her. But lo and behold, she surprised all of us and walked in the front door. It was a great reminder of how we all look forward to these kinds of family gatherings, and of how I’ll be able to look forward to them with the cupcake as she grows up and adds to the giant pool of estrogen herself.

When I was planning my wedding, I found that I’d look forward to things like bridal showers, but when they actually came about, I’d start to feel self-conscious about all the attention and didn’t relax as much as I’d expected. In contrast, baby showers felt like being a kid again and having a birthday party. For one thing, the presents aren’t cutlery and plates; they’re onesies and baby socks (I have as soft spot for baby socks, something about how they evoke baby toenails) and stuffed animals. Also, there wasn’t any pressure to stay slim and wear a tight dress any time soon, so I could completely indulge in all the sweets.

And let me tell you about the sweet stuff. Two of my cousins have started a cake and cookie business in Richmond, so they made an adorable pink bunny cake for the shower and a bunch of decorated cookies too. They all tasted as good as they looked. Since I can’t drink, I was so looking forward to the sugar of the weekend, and it did not disappoint. Here are photos of the cake and cookies. The bunny is from our crib theme, Pottery Barn Kids’ “B is for Bunny” collection, and, yes, they made it too. I think they should go on one of those Food Network cake challenge shows (cakes are so hot right now).

Babymamma and baby grandparents in Richmond.

The day after the family shower, we had the co-ed friends shower in Charlottesville, and, incredibly, the surprise guests kept on coming. First, we just loved telling people in Boston that we were having a baby shower at our friends’ brewery, not only because of the street cred we get for having friends who own a brewery, but because that’s not the go-to place for baby showers for most couples. But Internet, we are not most couples. Our friends Mandi and Taylor built and opened Blue Mountain Brewery right about when we moved from Charlottesville to Boston, and it has these amazing mountain views and a deck for outdoor seating (fireplace inside for cozy winters too), so we thought it would be a great place to gather just a few friends and visit. What we got instead was the rock star treatment. They set up a separate roped-off area for us to have food and drinks, had barrels to put presents on, chairs for people to sit in if they wanted, and basically created a little VIP Shukla shower area so we could all visit and play away from the bustle of the other customers. It was beyond cool.

But then. THEN. Out walked three people who we did not expect to see. What’s the easiest way to set off a pregnant woman’s hormones? Have three of her favorite people fly in from across the entire country and appear at her baby shower. I was glad to have my giant sunglasses on to hide my wet eyes! During our last year living in Charlottesville, I did happy hours every week with this amazing group of girls. It was like a lifeline for the five of us through different personal challenges and transitions, an overabundance of beer and laughter every week. Then Anil and I moved to Boston, another couple moved to Utah, and another moved to Portland, Oregon. These are the people who walked out of the brewery in Charlottesville when they were supposed to still be in Utah and Oregon! It was fantastic. The whole shower was fantastic. So many of our favorite people were all in one place that day, including friends that Anil has known since childhood, friends from college, and from our four years of living in Charlottesville for med school. We felt so lucky to have such strong connections with people that we think so highly of and with a place that is so unique. Below is a photo we took before the festivities got underway of our big original Charlottesville crew.

Here are some other highlights. (The photos are small, so click if you want to see more closely.) First, the cupcakes, of which I ate about five.

For gifts, we asked people to bring a favorite book on which they could inscribe a note so that when we read to the cupcake we'll think of our friends. So we got a running start to her library, which of course is hugely exciting for lit-major mama. We also got a head start to her being the coolest baby on the block. Check out these baby Chuck Taylors!

A special guest at the shower was a certain 20 year-old who I happened to meet in a college women and middle school girls mentoring program during my fourth year at UVA. Caitlin was 12 then, and now she's 20 and at my baby shower! She's a second year at UVA and also, among a ridiculous list of talents, is an artist of onsies. She hand-painted six different onesies--seriously! They're washable and totally wearable. Click on this photo to see the onesies in larger scale (IOU a better close-up photo when I unpack all the shower gifts!) and she has more at her web site, La Petit Lapan (she's also a French minor). Among her long list of accomplishments, though, the one I'm most excited about is babysitter extraordinaire.

That's the brewery and outdoor deck in the background, and in the foreground, Blue Mountain Brewery onesies! These are officially from Hayden, the owners' son, so that our cupcake can represent her soon-to-be favorite spot.

After all this, (and I know it’s ridiculous to have another shower, but... ) we do live in Boston, and my friends here wanted to do something too. So my friend Aisha, who I’ve known since college and now lives five minutes away, volunteered her apartment and my Bostonian BFF Katie claimed all cooking responsibilities.

I think a friend at this shower said it best, when I told her that I’d been apprehensive about everyone having fun because not many invitees really knew each other coming into the shower; she replied, “Yeah but you and Anil always have such cool friends, everyone is interesting and laid back so we always have fun.” That’s a paraphrase, but I think it’s so true. I looked around the room and saw a fashion designer, an opera singer, an anesthesiologist, an ER doctor, a social worker and awesome mom of a one-year old (who behaved beyond beautifully), a linguist who just finished her PhD, an aspiring professional chef, and I could go on and on but then I’d just be bragging. Thanks for being cool, friends!

And because there was now a theme of surprises, I shouldn’t have been so shocked when my friend from high school (aforementioned fashion designer) walked in the door, having taken a bus that morning from New York City. But I was shocked! So again, it was a day to really celebrate all of the wonderful people that Anil and I have been lucky enough to know over the years, and to be amazed and thankful at how excited they are for us and our crazy future of parenthood.

THANK YOU EVERYONE!!!

Now I just have a million thank you notes to write. And a lot of really adorable baby socks to wash. Couldn’t be happier to do both.

attitude adjustment... maybe

It hit me last night that maybe this situation really isn’t about me anymore. You might be saying “DUH!” and I might have said that had I read someone else writing this before I was pregnant myself. I know people who, the minute they get a positive pregnancy test, or before they even conceive and start inhaling spinach, have this perspective of “it’s not about just me anymore.” But I didn’t have that. To me, the cupcake was a little bundle of cells slowly forming into something kind of nebulous and intangible, whereas I was very tangible. I was the one with the nausea and the pot belly for the first few months. Then I was the one with the pregnancy-chic second trimester bump, buying and sporting increasingly more maternity clothes. And for the past couple of months, I’ve been the one with increasing pain in my ribcage; I’m the one who has to come home at night and wrap an ice pack around her ribs in order to achieve any semblance of comfort. The cupcake is safe, sound, and comfortable in her little waterbed, oblivious to all of this. Of course, I’m taking care of myself and following the rules about pregnancy in terms of what I take in and share with her, but it’s still me that has to order water instead of the Harpoon IPA that I salivate over at restaurants.

But as I reach this funny place of being pregnant for nearly a month now after I was actually born (I’m almost 30 weeks and I was born around 26 weeks), and as my belly gets noticeably bigger and I feel noticeably more limited physically and even mentally as exhaustion and frustration set in more frequently, I’m starting to come around to that “it’s not about me anymore” understanding—perhaps as a coping mechanism as much as anything else. These last two months are more about keeping her safe and in the womb so that she can finish developing and get ready for her big debut. It’s less and less possible for me to do the things I’m used to, so it necessarily becomes more about me being a vessel than me being an active participant in the life I’m used to living. And that’s a tough adjustment to make—I think it’s what I’ve been struggling with for the past week or so, feeling a lot of loss of what I’m used to doing, and for me that has translated into who I'm used to being. Maybe if I can shift my thinking towards slowing down and being a human incubator, then I can still feel productive even if the framework is so different.

Not that I’m going to now sit on the couch and watch Oprah all day long. That’s not being a very good vessel. I’m still going to the gym and doing light cardio (on machines that minimize bouncing of the bladder) and light weights, and I’m committing to weekly prenatal yoga again. I’m seeing friends, just earlier in the day or evening. I’m working a few times a week, but for shorter shifts, doing less physical tasks while there, and occasionally putting an ice pack in my bra band to ease the pain in my upper back/ribs. I tell people I’m doing a reality show and it’s my mic. I thought I’d have another good month or so before I had to make these kinds of accommodations. (Why? No reason. I don’t think anyone expects to have a tough pregnancy. You just go in hopeful then adjust with what you get.) I need to accept that the shift is happening sooner than I’d hoped.

So as I tried to explain to Anil last night, it’s not that I had this epiphany and am ready to become a martyr, but I’m working on a subtle shift in attitude that I hope will ease the frustrations I’ve felt as of late of all the loss and sacrifice I’m starting to feel. Because that’s still what it is—loss and sacrifice. I don’t buy that it’s ever so black and white that you’re so happy for the baby you’re expecting, or the baby that you then have, that you don’t feel the sting of loss of your former self and a lot of what defined that self for you. It’s only natural. But maybe I can start to accept those losses more if I can re-frame them. Or if I can reframe my “job” for the next two months. After all, I’m asking other people to adjust their expectations of me. Anil is doing more around the house and with Bailey. Bailey isn’t getting as much exercise when it’s just me at home. My friends agree to earlier dinners and less adventurous day plans. I don’t like cutting back—it’s hard because it leaves these open gaps of “Who am I now if I’m not doing what I usually do?” But if I can start thinking of it as for a reason rather than as a loss or a demotion (and again, from an outside perspective I know that this "for a reason" thing earns another resounding DUH, but again, it's just not that simple in real life), maybe I can get through these next two months with a better attitude. And more blog posts J.

belly and Bailey at 29 weeks

This was taken yesterday; I'm now at 29 weeks. The count stops at around 40 weeks, so we're definitely getting close! My due date is January 30, so as I realize that it's already mid-November, it hits me that I'm past the three-months-to-go point.

Bailey and I start our training class tonight at Boston's Pawsitive Dog. Anil and I went to a class called "Barks & Babies" a month or so ago, and it was so helpful that we signed on for a seven-week series for Bailey, to work on his manners and to refresh his training for when the baby comes. We realized that we're so used to our/his routine and schedule that we overlook a lot of behaviors of his that could be problematic or, at the very least, really annoying when there is a tiny new human in the house. At the top of my list is making him into a decent walker, one who doesn't tug and pull and bark when he sees dogs/people/inanimate objects that he either wants to play with or is startled by. We're hoping that Anil and I can both attend classes with Bailey in the upcoming weeks, but I'm going to this first one by myself with the B. I gave him a lecture last night about how he has to behave and how all of these changes are afoot, and this was his response.

extended cab

I need an extended cab rib cage. I wish I could upgrade to it like I was buying a Toyota truck.

I've been a slack blogger lately because my days consist of doing something that's fun, then getting really tired and sore from it and spending the rest of the day/night icing my ribs, taking a hot bath, and sulking about how when I'm not doing either of those things I'm just gritting my teeth against this crazy pain. AND I HAVE THREE MORE MONTHS! Sorry, not yelling at you. I've quickly gone from, "Wow! Only three more months!" to "Ughghh how am I going to last three more months?!" Actually I go back and forth between the two daily.

Anil went to Miami this weekend for a college friend's bachelor party while I had a Boston baby shower--brunch with some awesome Beantown girls. I've been wanting to write just the right words for the baby showers that we've been given, because they were each so wonderful and unique, and I've been avoiding it because I've been so grumpy every time I've sat at my computer. And it's hard to concentrate right now when the cupcake is doing gymnastics in my belly. You can see my belly moving around and poking out here and there; it's pretty funny.

So for now I'm going to post a couple of past-due pictures. I'm 28 weeks now, but this photo is from about 25 weeks.

Looking bigger, huh?

Oh, and in honor of Halloween, here are two Great Pumpkins recently seen around Boston:

Anil and I carved the pumpkin on Halloween, saving me from a hormonal meltdown that can be summed up like this: "You're home late and now it's dark and we can't carve the pumpkin and now we missed Halloween and you have to work on Thanksgiving and probably on Christmas too and we'll never have a holiday with just the two of us again and... okay... deep breath... I know I'm being crazy..." And then we carved the pumpkin like we said we would, put it outside with a candle, took pictures, then went back inside and ordered Chinese food that we ate at 9:30 before going to bed before 11 p.m.--at about the time we heard the BC students on our street heading out for their Halloween parties. That's the thing about our life. Things won't happen when they "should," and we (okay, I) can't get stuck in the shoulds. Holidays might happen a day before or after the actual date some years depending on Anil's work schedule, and carving the pumpkin on the front stoop before the sun goes down turned into carving on the coffee table after dark, but what matters is that it happened. And our pumpkin makes me smile every time I go outside.

I call the pullover jacket in the picture above my Great Pumpkin jacket, and that's me wearing it to the Head of the Charles races in Cambridge. My friend Katie and I went all the way to Cambridge (that emphasis is for her because she's a true Boston girl and bristles at crossing the river to Cambridge) just to eat kettle corn and drink apple cider. Mission accomplished and well worth it. In the photo with the cider cups, you can make out people rowing in the Charles River below (or you can at least believe me when I tell you that that speck is someone rowing on the Charles--you can click to zoom in and see much more), so we did see some actual rowing too.

I don't remember exactly, but it's a fair bet that this day was followed by me making waffles and icing my ribs. Again though, like the arduous bus ride to Cambridge that Katie may never let me live down (note to self--bus is never faster/easier than the subway), the adventure was worth the discomfort. And I just walked into a giant metaphor for pregnancy in general... nice.

um... thanks?

Yesterday I was meeting my partner in pregnancy at the Pru (wait, not Anil, not that kind of partner--just my pregnant friend), so I got off the T (that's what we call the subway, "T" for train) and walked out on Mass. Ave. where there is usually a line of various people asking for change. This is near where I work, and I've noticed that in the past week or so, I seem to have gotten big enough for the bums to use my belly as a business strategy--they don't just ask for change; they yell "Congratulations!" as I walk by. So this guy yesterday goes, "Congratulations! I hope you have triplets."

Am I really getting that big??