Hail and a Rainbow

It hailed like crazy today, then the brightest and fullest rainbow I've ever seen filled the sky. It was a full arch, with a shadow rainbow not quite as bright. Halen saw it too. It was pretty cool. The clouds and sky are almost always beautiful and extra dramatic here. Even on a clear sunny day, the sky somehow manages to be incredible. I sure do love it here. I wish some of my homies would come to visit, so I can talk you into moving here!

Week 30

Your baby's a bit more than 15 1/2 inches long now, and she weighs almost 3 pounds. A pint and a half of amniotic fluid surrounds her, but that volume will decrease as she gets bigger and takes up more room in your uterus. Her eyesight continues to develop, though it's not very keen; even after she's born, she'll keep her eyes closed for a good part of the day. When she does open them, she'll respond to changes in light but will have 20/400 vision — which means she can only make out objects a few inches from her face. (Normal adult vision is 20/20.)

Bikes, Vegan Food, And The Beaches

If I lived in Atlanta still, I would go to Pensacola for this.

Vegan Bento

I read an article in the paper yesterday about Japanese bento boxes. http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/features/archive/news/
I'm totally into it!!! I started googling bentos and then vegan bento. I found a college kid who makes her own vegan bentos at veganbento.blogspot.com. Most of my vegan friends are already familiar with veganlunchbox.blogspot.com, she sometimes does bento inspired vegan lunches as well. Since Halen isn't in school yet, I think I'll start practicing making school and work bentos for Dan. He's going to be so excited!!! Haha.
Christy

Mirror Lake

We did a really great hike on Saturday. It was a 3 mile round trip up to Mirror Lake. Usually, you can see amazing views of Mt. Hood from here, with it's peak reflected down into the lake. We went on a day that was a little foggy and cloudy (not to mention cold, fall has reached the northwest), so we couldn't see the Hood. We will definitely go back. It was a good hike for Halen. He's getting so good at hiking. He knows to watch out for the roots and rocks. He runs up to them, steps up on them, and jumps forward. He can trek up a mountain for a really long time. He gets tuckered out sometimes and takes a break on one of our shoulders. He gets his energy back quick and wants to do his own hiking. We saw a neat little lizard that Halen thought was really cool. The lake also had crawdads as big as your hand. Halen was into those too. Dan tried balancing on some rocks over the water, hovering down to catch one for him to get a closer look. He almost got pinched a couple times and almost fell in the water a few more times. He never caught one. I guess he's not quite one with nature, like Kevin Bacon in White Water Summer. If you know Dan at all, you know that if he had fallen in the water, that the day, week, month, and year would have been ruined. The boy has an aversion to water, unless it's hot and running from a faucet. I'm an evil person because I still think it would have been funny as shit if he had fallen in the water. This has been a major point of contention in our relationship, when bad things happen to Dan, I laugh like hell. I am laughing at the thought of it now. I even try not to because I know how sad he is when he gets wet (or whatever). I try to be sympathetic, but the giggles just start coming. I have no control over it. Luckily, he still loves me, even though I can sometimes be terrible in this way.
On another note, my belly is big and heavy. I am on my way out the door to buy one of those pregnant belly support bands. My ab muscles at the top of the baby ball already feel like they are being worked and stretched to full capacity. I never got one when I was pregnant with Halen, but I am being a bigger baby this time. I just want to be comfortable.
I saw a sale on travelocity, tickets from ATL to PDX are $265. Come on fools, visit us!
oh yeah, Dan starts school today. He has his first day of training at REI tomorrow. Next weekend, if weather permits, we're going camping. Whoopi!
Christy

Pirates!

http://www.portlandpiratefestival.com/
this is going on here this weekend. Looks kinda fun. We might have to go!

Ta-Da Week 28

I'm officially in my third trimester. It has hit me like a brick wall. All the sudden, I feel like sleeping all the time. In reality, I don't get much sleep at all. I guess that's why I want it so bad. Things with the house in ATL are going good. We're almost done. I've got 3 different repairmen coming Monday to finish what needs to be done. I've gotten all kinds of forms filled out, notarized, and shipped back there. One more week and a day and we'll be out from under the house. I'm a little sad to see it go, our first house, but really happy to be where we are.
These two preggo pictures are now and then. The black and white one is from when I was pregnant with Halen. The striped shirt one is from today. I'm the same weekage in both of them. I think I'm bigger now than I was with Halen. I have one word to say about that, Utoh.
The one of Halen doing 'balancing baby' is now called 'ta-da.' Halen loves it. He asks Dan, 'do ta-da daddy, do ta-da.' Then when he gets up there, he says ta-da. It's real cute. Dan seems to think that if he does it everyday, that he'll continue to be able to do it up into Halen's adulthood. I think Halen will be as big as Dan by the time he's 15, if not bigger. I'm waiting to see that trick.

Peach Upside Down Cake

It rained on Sunday. We didn't go hiking. Instead, we went shopping for Halen's very own baseball glove. He needed one for his right hand, since he's definitely looking like he's gona be a lefty. We have several around the house, but they're all for right handers and way too big. He's kind of excited about it! Then we went to Old Navy where they are having a kid's clothes sale. The baby got his first outfit. He's going to mostly wear Halen hand-me-downs, but we want him to have a few things of his own too. It's the cutest little striped hooded sweatsuit material onesie! Why don't they make these in my size? Then we headed to the thrift store where Halen got a sit-n-spin. He loves that as well. He carries it all over the house and does all kinds of daring spin around stunts in terrible places, like right at the corner of the kitchen table. I'm trying to get him to keep the thing away from furniture, but he likes to bring it close to furniture so he can hold on to the furniture in order to get a good standing spin. I think it'll be an endless battle.
After all the shopping and a good nap, Halen helped me make this yummy vegan peach upside down cake. He's quite the baker, and batter licker upper too.

Nutshell

We tried a new vegan restaurant last night, called Nutshell. It was real good. It was a fancy place, where you choose your bread, olive oil, and salt for dipping. There where about 7 different olive oils and 20 different salts. We got the assortment of bread, the organic Portugese olive oil, and the red maple salt. That was some salty salt! I got the Yukon gold potato pancakes with Kale and forest mushrooms. Dan had the Jamaican BBQ, which was an assortment of all kinds of things Jamaican. The food was fancifully displayed and very good. Halen had the Jamaican rice and beans. I would have loved to have had some wine and dessert, but there's no wine for pregnant mommies and no dessert when Halen was as tired as he was. The chef, who used to be over 300 pounds (I read an article in the paper), came and asked us how our food was and thanked us for coming in. He used to be a chef at some fancy LA restaurant (not vegan), when he decided to go vegan to get healthy. Now he's a rail. There where no fake meats on the menu, which I found refreshing. I'm tired of un-chicken fried steak. The place was packed.
Tomorrow morning we are going to finally try Veganopolis. It's a downtown vegan spot, that just serves breakfast and lunch. It's there for all of Portland's vegan business people. Luckily for us, they're open on Saturday's too. We're going to try the brunch. After that, we're going to check out Food Fight, the all vegan grocery store. We tried all kinds of yummy new places when we first got here, but then we settled into our favorites of those places and haven't tried anything new in awhile. We're also broke as all hell. Dan gets paid today though, so we're going to live it up just a little this weekend. I'm sure we'll go for another hike on Sunday. Look for pictures from that.
Christy

Timothy Lake

This is a fused panoramic picture of Timothy Lake, part of the hiking trail we did the day of Little Crater Lake. I finally edited the pics together. This spot was cool. We watched several hawks fly down into the water and come out with fish. Dan thinks he saw bear poop. I can handle poop, hopefully we'll never see an actual bear.

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Hidden Lake

We went hiking again yesterday. The day started off interestingly enough, getting totally lost trying to find our trail head. We where on some crazy one-laned narrow as hell mountainous dirt road, going nowhere for several miles when we finally found a spot wide enough to turn around and just get out of there. The trees where so thick, that it was dark in the middle of the day. I kind of felt like we where driving into a horror movie. I was waiting for some mutant red necks to jump out and hack us all up. Once we got out of there, we gave up on the Ramona Falls trail, and headed to one down the street, Hidden Lake. Hidden Lake was a bit difficult at first, steep switchback climbs. Halen and I where both huffing and puffing. It eventually leveled out and was pleasant for everyone. We had to find an ingenious way to carry Halen for awhile, wedged between Dan and the backpack. It looked pretty cozy, I don't think I would have fit though, especially with this ever-protruding belly of mine. When we got close to the lake, the air started smelling like blueberry pop tarts. It was amazing. It made me real hungry. There where lots of huckleberries around. Dan wouldn't let me try one because we weren't sure that's what they where. Later, another family came up, saw them, and said, "ooh, Huckleberries, and started picking and eating them." After that, I tried one. I didn't tell Dan though. He's berry paranoid. It wasn't very good, too sour. We had a nice picnic lunch by the lake. It was super clear, with little fish swimming around. Halen almost fell asleep cuddling with Dan, but Bruce's rambunctiousness kept that from happening. Halen loves hiking. He wants to climb onto every rock and walk atop every fallen tree. He always points at the big trees all around and says, "Haynen's trees." He currently pronounces his name with an N instead of an L. It's weird because he's getting pretty good at pronouncing his L's correctly now. They always sounded like W's in other words though. Just in his name, it's an N.
I've become completely paranoid of mountain lions. After our last hike, I realized that we didn't know anything about the local wildlife population. I didn't know if there where bears here, and if so, grizzlies or just black? What about mountain lions and wolves? I did an internet search and found all the info I needed on the national wildlife website. There are black bears, mountain lions, and wolves. The wolves never attack humans. The black bears very very rarely do, you have to pretty much piss them off and be the one to start the fight (i don't think i'll try that). The mountain lions though, there are a few too many mountain lion attack stories online for my liking. Those buggers are smart and fast. Fortunately, they're not even in the Mt. Hood National Forest, where we've done all our hiking so far. They're more in the coastal ranges. Actually, there is only one report in all of Oregon of a mountain lion encounter, and the authorities say they think it was probably really just a bobcat. There was no attack, just a scared person. Supposedly, as long as the people aren't sprawling too much into mountain lion territory and their wildlife foodsource is plentiful, humans will never see one. Oregon still seems to be safe in that way, but I read a few too many official reports. I don't feel safe right now, in my living room. I think mountain lions are my new irrational fear, the old one being werewolves. My aunt and I saw a mountain lion in the wild. We where safely enclosed in the car, driving down a dirt road in the Arizona Anchas mountains. We where in high desert mountains, where there was hardly any brush on either side of us. This thing came out of nowhere, darted in front of us, and disappeared into nowhere. It was as stealth as anything could have been. It was only visible for a split second, disappearing into nothing. We stopped and looked for it. How could we not see it? It had been moving so fast, surely there'd be a hint of it in all that open space. I felt lucky to have seen one in the wild. I guess I still do. Back then, I didn't even consider it being a possible threat to me, and spent the next several days hiking around the same areas we saw the thing. Now, when I think back on it, I get the chills. I think motherhood has made me a bit more cautious in the wild, and in every other aspect as well. That's enough blogging for now. Time for a samwich (that's a Halen pronunciation).

Pooed and Tattooed

We ordered this potty seat with a stool for Halen and waited for it forever. It really seemed like Halen didn't want to use the potty because he was afraid he may fall in. His little seat that we had at the old house got stolen with our camping gear. I bet they where stoked on that steal! We got his new seat last night. We set up and he went pee pee on the potty right away. He sat there forever! He didn't want to get down. When he did get down, he got right back up again, then down, then up again, then a few more times of that and we finally convinced him to take a bath. Usually, the first thing Halen says in the morning has something to do with food. Today, it was "Halen's potty." So, we went straight to the potty where he peed and pooed. He got the sweet rose chest tattoo for it. I really think this is the beginning of the end of poopy diapers! Whoopi!

On a completely other note, we had our first midwife appointment here yesterday. I had started seeing someone in Atlanta, but it wasn't as exciting because she wasn't going to be the one to actually catch the baby. The whole family went to her little office in her home. Her name is Kelli. Her intern's name is also Kelly, who will also be at the birth. We did all the normal check up stuff and talked about my ideal birth. I am so excited! I told her that we had a really big tub that I'd like to birth in. She said that was fine, or she can bring one of her horse troughs that she uses as birthing pools. That would be a pretty funny birth story, "I was born in a horse trough in the living room of our double wide trailer." I think we'll probably stick with the bath tub, but he can say that he was almost born in a horse trough if he wants to. I expressed my concerns about this baby being another big one. She didn't seem concerned at all. She said that the warmth and counter-pressure of the water helps prevent tears. It's also supposed to be a great help with pain. Home-birth midwives are the way to go! I'm so extremely excited about this birth. Most of my worry and concerns about birthing Halen revolved around me being in a hospital, where I ultimately didn't have the final say in the birth. They forced me into the pitocin and epidural. I am pretty sure that if I had had an obgyn, I would have been made to have a c-section. C-sections are terrifying! I can't understand how some women choose them over the completely natural birth process. It's a major surgery, cutting several inches across through several layers: skin, muscle, and uterus. The recovery is a bitch too, not to mention all the extra risks involved in hurting the baby and mother. Anyway, the fear of possibly being made to have a c-section is gone with a homebirth. I know that if there where some kind of major emergency, I could get whisped away to the hospital and have one done. With a hospital birth, that "emergency" can sometimes just be that the doctor's shift is ending soon and he doesn't want to be late for dinner. With a home birth, I know that that really was the last and only option. I also don't have to worry about when to go to the hospital. When I go into labor, I can just take it easy and relax around the house until it's time for the midwife to come to me. I can't believe I have to wait another 3 months for this occurance. I want my new baby now. I'm starting to get pretty uncomfortable in the mid-section. I'm entering into the third trimester and it's suddenly nearly impossible to bend over, stand from sitting, or sleep comfortably. At least it's not oppressively hot here. The weather is perfect for pregnancy, and every other possible human condition. We just have good weather here.
Christy

Little Crater Lake

We went hiking today. This gorgeous blue spring is Little Crater Lake. The big one is Timothy Lake. I'll tell you what, Oregon is pretty. I am definitely staying awhile!

Beavers Game

Yesterday, we went to a baseball game. The Portland Beavers are a minor league team. The seats are much much cheaper. We where right behind home plate, for only $13 a pop. The stadium has veggie dogs and burgers. Halen fell in love with Boomer, the Beaver's mascot. It was a good day. Check out the sweet pirate tattoo on Halen's forearm. He now expects a tattoo as a prize for pooping in the potty. Soon, hopefully he'll be all sleeved out. We're tired of the poopies.

For The Vegans

Bob's Red Mill makes a dairy free / gluten free brownie mix that's easy and super yummy. Find it and make the version on the back with the cream cheese. Tofutti works great.
Nature's Valley, a Portland company, makes vegan chocolate chip cookies that taste just like those yummy Soft Batch cookies that used to be vegan. These are made to be vegan though, with good whole foods ingredients. Look for them or request them in stores near you. Or... you could come visit us here and we'll get you some.

Under Contract

Our house is under contract! Whoopi
Halen went swimming in the river today. He wanted me to go deeper with him. I wasn't in my skivvies like he was though. Look at that belly on me! It's getting big! My new bra makes my boobs real pointy like they liked them in the 50s. Pretty hot.