A break from our regularly scheduled programming

I started this blog by writing about grocery stores. And I shall add another post along those lines.
In Provo, all the grocery stores would advertise their prices by saying "10/$6," "3/$5," "4/$5," and whatnot. In the end, your brain is so full of fractions that you have NO IDEA how much you're paying for your fruit, milk, or yogurt, and you just buy what you think MIGHT be the cheapest. And since these are the special sale prices, they don't break it down for you and tell you how much it is per ounce or each or whatever. Booo!!! I didn't realize how much I hated it.
But I love my new store here in Boise, WinCo Foods. Everything is super cheap, and instead of trying to trick you into buying whatever they put a large sign over, they simply tell you how much your food costs. "$.88/lb" or whatever. Their produce is always really cheap, with a lot of variety. And they have a large bulk foods section. And throughout the store, there's the HyTop generic brand. Yay!
I also found another store, Grocery Outlet. This is a store where basically they sell whatever overstocks or off-brand items other stores can't sell. I got some peanut butter from Portales, NM! And they had peppermint ice cream-- in June! They also sell Sara Lee bread items for $1-- even the mini-bagels, which are usually $3.50! Some items, like the bread, are really cheap, and others are just moderately cheap-- about what you can find in another store on sale or in an off-brand. However, they don't have the variety or the produce that other stores have. And once I looked into it, most of their items are about the same prices as at WinCo.
Boise is the home of Albertson's, and I was afraid I'd have to shop there. It's overpriced and confusing in the lay-out. Boo.
But I found a couple good stores, and I'm a happy camper!

Pics and stats

And my personal favorite:

This week on Tuesday, Penny is two weeks old! This means we went to the doctor to find out how she's doing.

She's doing great, of course. When we left the hospital, she was 6 lbs 14 oz, and on Tuesday she was 8 lbs 9 oz. That's a gain of 1 lb 11 0z! I knew she'd grown, but wow! And she grew a whole inch. I don't think I've grown a whole inch in 2 weeks since I was 11. :)

Anyway, this puts her at 75 percentile for both height and weight. And that makes me happy. I suppose whatever she turned out to be, it would make me happy. I'm just easily pleased.

They pricked her heel to draw some blood, and she screamed as if it were the most painful thing she'd ever experienced-- which it may have been. And that made me kind of giggle.

In my defense, it was the kind of uncomfortable giggle where you know you should have SOME reaction, so you choose to laugh. Yes, I'm that terrible. ;)

And this is what I get to look at all day, my role models. It's a wonder I get anything done! Oh wait....

It must be love

Last night Penny only woke me up a couple times, and then I got a nap before our 12:00 church. I expected to feel pretty great. I did not.
During the last hour, I just felt worse and worse. I got home and tried to sleep but didn't feel good until Kevin brought me a brownie and some ibuprofen. Wonderful stuff.
Anyway, but I was noticing that no matter how tired and sore I was, and no matter how incredulous I was that she needed to eat (AGAIN!), I still love seeing my little girl. I still think she's beautiful. I still love to hold her, even when my whole body hurts (although I do wish it didn't hurt).
I guess it must be love. :)

Why I'm not a cinematographer

So this is just a minute-long video of my baby hiccupping. Consider yourself warned.
Um, and I'm sorry about the sideways video... and the commentary.

What I've been doing lately

I think the only way to spend your time when you have a newborn baby is to hold her, stare fondly at her, and of course sleep while she sleeps.
Here is a picture of us playing dress-up. Please notice the INCREDIBLY AWESOME tennis-shoe booties, crocheted by the INCREDIBLY AWESOME Melanie Helm: My mom is visiting with us, and here she is with a smiling Penny. Okay, so it's just a random face to her at this time, but we think it's cute:

This was taken today. The thing on her head is a hat; you just can't see the yellow top of it.

She does open her eyes once in a while. And they are very dark, even darker than Kevin's.

On Sunday we took her to church-- just for Sacrament meeting. She really liked the singing and decided to try it herself:

Toby tries to help out sometimes:

Last night she got her first bath. She turned really pink from crying. How cute!

Then she gazed into Kevin's eyes while wearing her new bathrobe:

We had a ward swimming party, and Penelope decided to try out her wading skills.

The gory details... kind of

So here's the long, detailed story of Penny's birth:
On Monday night, we had our childbirth class, but we decided not to go. It started at 6:30, but at 5:30 we had gotten a phone call from Kevin's brother John. They're on a road trip, and could they come stay with us that night? Sure!
Elisa, John's wife, is allergic to cats, so we needed to vacuum and de-cat the place, plus Howie was still missing, and we needed to post signs for him. So there was no time for the childbirth class. Plus we didn't really like it-- pretty boring.
You already know what happened with Howie, and then a few hours later, our guests arrived. While we were running around posting Lost Cat posters, I was having contractions (which I wrote in that post as "getting tired") every 15 minutes or so. Once John and Elisa came over, they were every 10 minutes. We talked and chatted and generally hung out. I had a blast talking to them, but every once in a while (about 7 minutes and then 5) I'd need to stop talking, relax, and do some deep breathing. We went to bed at like midnight, and by then the contractions were like 3 minutes apart.
I called the hospital, and they figured I should probably come in, which I did at 12:30. Once I got in, the contractions stopped for a while, and I felt kind of stupid. But they found that I was dialated to 5 cm, and I didn't feel so dumb.
I wanted to take one last pregnancy picture, and when Kevin tried to do so, we found that the camera was missing its memory card. He drove home (like 2 blocks away) while I walked the halls for a few minutes. Eventually, at like 2:00, they admitted me to the hospital, and by 2:30 or so I had an epidural and all was good. The contractions had gotten to the point where slow breathing was beginning to not quite cut it, but they weren't too horrible. I feel lucky to have an epidural, but I think that I COULD have done it naturally if I had to. That's nice to know. It's also REALLY nice to know that I got to skip it.
Once I was pain-free, I got to sleep (or at least relax) for a few hours. It felt like being on a long airplane trip. There was a bunch of constant background noise (Penny's heartbeat and the aquarium noises coming from the fish program I was watching on TV). It was dark except for the glow of the TV. I was drinking juice from little cups covered with foil, and I couldn't feel my legs. Exactly like flying to China.
At 7:00, the doctor came in, and I was ready to push. I pushed and pushed (at least I think I did. I was quite numb), and Penny finally came at 9:43 AM.
I'm not sure how long that was. Do I start counting from when I was admitted to the hospital? When I came and started walking the halls? When I started having contractions sometime earlier that afternoon? Whatever. It was long enough, but I didn't mind because I couldn't feel it. The hardest part was that pushing for 2 1/2 hours was really tiring. Otherwise, I could totally do labor any time!
I'm so very blessed and very lucky to have had such an easy time. Once morning sickness subsided, I had a very easy time of being pregnant. I didn't have any weird complications, and Penny and I are both healthy and quickly recovered. I know I don't "deserve" any of this, but it reminds me of that part of Mosiah 2:
20 I say unto you, my brethren, that if you should render all the thanks and praise which your whole soul has power to possess, to that God who has created you, and has kept and preserved you, and has caused that ye should rejoice, and has granted that ye should live in peace one with another— 21 I say unto you that if ye should serve him who has created you from the beginning, and is preserving you from day to day, by lending you breath, that ye may live and move and do according to your own will, and even supporting you from one moment to another—I say, if ye should serve him with all your whole souls yet ye would be unprofitable servants. 22 And behold, all that he requires of you is to keep his commandments; and he has promised you that if ye would keep his commandments ye should prosper in the land; and he never doth vary from that which he hath said; therefore, if ye do keep his commandments he doth bless you and prosper you.
I have so many more blessings than I could possibly write about on here, but I will just try to be grateful!

I am six days, going on seven days

D0-do, do-do do dooooo.....
That song has been in my head aaaalllll day.
Replacing "Beautiful Girl" from Singin' in the Rain.
I just wish I knew more of the words. I think Penny will grow up thinking that most lyrics of most songs are "do do do."
Which they are.

More Pictures (or "I Still Love My Family")

Penny really looks like Kevin, even her feet:This is a content little girl in her.... NEW CRIB!!! This is an unhappy baby in her... new crib.And when Chelsea isn't available, Penny's happy with Kevin's finger.

When it rains, it pours (and that's quite the image. Sorry)

The thing I like about cats is that they're pretty much no-maintenance pets. You leave for the day, they're fine. You leave for a weekend, you just heap on some extra food and they're mostly fine. You pet them, they purr. They meow occasionally.
But then you have times when they're not fine.
We lost Howie and then he came back, and that's the most trouble we've had with our cats.
But when we went to the hospital, our Toby decided to get sick in the fiercest way. For a couple days, he just didn't make it to the litter box.
(Emotional post-partum moment here) You guys, I am just so lucky to have Kevin. He loves me, he loves Penny, and he even loves our exploding cats.
Because Toby didn't stop there. (Explicit bodily function descriptions ahead). Oh no, he hacked up hairballs, vomited everything he ate, and here's my favorite: instead of just missing the litter box, he started pooping nasty-smelling blood-ridden mucuous and hair.
This was a joy to come home to from the hospital. Not only did I have a brand new baby doing nothing but eating and pooping, but I had a cat who decided to revert to this behavior as well.
I couldn't deal with it that first day home, and while Kevin dutifully cleaned up our nasty house, we didn't take any action.
Yesterday, though, we took him to the vet. Toby, that is. I made an appointment and planned on taking Toby. Once I said this outloud, though, I realized how stupid it was to plan on taking a 4-day-old baby to THE VET. Um, of all disgusting places, that was possibly even worse than our house. (Which we have been cleaning constantly, but it's just frustrating.)
So obviously Kevin took the cat and I stayed home with Penny. An hour and a chunk of money later, Kevin brought Toby home with some medicine that keeps his innards in, an X-ray showing that Toby hadn't swallowed any pins or anything (a real threat in my house), and a dose of deworming medicine, which Howie got treated with as well.
Things are looking better. I'm still just washing my hands and taking care of the baby. She's beautiful. Toby is in one piece, and hopefully Howie has avoided the whole mess.
We'll keep you posted.
I'm sure you can hardly wait.

Penny: it's not like she was born yesterday

Here are some more pictures for everyone's enjoyment, especially my family's.
This is yesterday, when the nursery folks had cleaned up Penny and stuck the little yellow and blue bow in her hair. And this is just me holding Penny on my lap, once the bow had fallen off, apparently:

And here they'd stuck it back on, and I'm just showing you how pointy her head was, even after a whole day. I love her hair; it's so soft and dark!

Here is Penny doing what Penny does best. Kind of.
Okay, okay, here I am cheating and giving her some formula. Well, she'd chomp and chomp and chomp for like an hour and a half and still be starving by the end. To save my skin, we just decided to give her some formula to fill her up until my milk comes in.

And here we are on our way home, yesterday afternoon.

Cute little feet. They look just like Kevin's except wrinklier. :)

This is a really weird angle, but here we have Penny all buckled up and ready to go home!

The nice thing about cheating is that Kevin can feed her. It's a beautiful thing.

Sometimes when your baby is born a week early, you haven't bought everything you need yet. So Penny came home and slept in this suitcase next to our bed. She fits when she's on the diagonal, and we're picking up a crib tomorrow morning.

Penny for your thoughts

Penelope Louise Fisher

I'm not going to write too much, but I did have a baby this morning.
We went to the hospital at 12:30, and then at 9:43 AM, Penelope Louise Fisher popped into the world. She was 7 pounds, 3 ounces, and 20 inches long. Maybe I'll give more details later, but for now (and especially for my family) here are some pictures.

This is how big I was before getting admitted. We're lucky my friend Diana from Utah requested a final belly picture. We took one earlier, but found that I had left the camera's memory card at home. So I walked the halls while Kevin ran home (2 blocks away)

Umm, Chelsea's making me blog. This is a baby. Isn't she cute.

Gotta say, newborns aren't super-pretty. Chelsea is still stealing the show.

Though, when its your own baby, they are astoundingly beautiful.

Beautiful newborn!

Note from Kevin: Super-proud dad here! Little Penny (Elisa says it should be Penny-bean) makes me smile. Real big. I just keep thinking about how to protect her and let her find her wings at the same time. Typical dad stuff. I know she'll bring all of us joy.

Chelsea always impresses me. She treated me like a prince while going through an incredibly difficult time. She also exuded beauty the whole time, as you can see. Hats off to (in my not-so-humble opinion) the best woman in the world.

Money well spent

Since I'm a stay-at-home mom with no kids, I have a lot of time on my hands. Today my biggest (and only) task was to make cat flyers to post around the neighborhood. We made some on Sunday just on our printer, but we were out of black ink. So they started out kind of weird looking (we colored in the black parts with a pencil), and then after the rain all afternoon, they were pretty much useless and illegible.
So I went to Kinko's and made some nice color copies, and this evening Kevin and I plastered our entire block with them. We replaced the old ones, using staples this time instead of magic tape. I got kind of tired from walking around, so while Kevin went to put up the last two flyers, I headed home.
Flyer:

We live upstairs, and so at the top of the stairs, I peeked over the rail to get a better view of the neighborhood. And there was Howie! I hollered for him and ran as fast as I could waddle over to where he was. He flopped over onto his back so I could rub his belly while he purred. He was FILTHY! All his fuzzy white parts were full of leaves and dirt. But I grabbed him and brought him inside... to stay.
I'm happy the posters worked so fast.
Toby missed Howie a lot. He tried to get me to chase him around the apartment, but being 9 months pregnant, I wasn't very fun. I waved his toy around, but he didn't chase it. He doesn't really chase the toy; he just chases Howie who chases the toy. Toby meowed at the window a lot, and I could tell he wondered where Howie was. It kind of made me sad, especially when I had to leave, because I knew he'd be bored in our tiny apartment. I'm glad he has his friend back. They're good buddies. Here is Toby, pining away at the window:

I know Toby missed him, but I missed him more. There should be a rule against hormonal, pregnant women losing cats. I wore myself out on Sunday from crying, and I cried a couple times this morning. By this afternoon, I had come to terms with the fact that Howie would either come back or not and there wasn't much more I could do about it (besides putting up posters).
So now we're all home. Except for Penny, who will now be able to meet Howie. I'm glad, because Howie is good with kids, unlike Toby.
And I know I'm rambling now, but I'm just so happy! Here is one happy girl:

And here is one filthy little cat:

And this is just for my family. See, it does exist!! We just turned the wrong way.

Sad day

Howie and Toby like to drink fresh water from the tub.

Howie liked (just this one time) to feel the baby kick.
And this is what happens when you use a flash on a cat. Glowing green eyes (instead of... glowing green eyes. Wait a second...)

This week our ward's organist went out of town, so he asked me to play the organ today in church. At BYU music camp in 1998, I took an hour organ lesson, so I'm quite the pro. I went over to the church twice to play around on the instrument, playing with the different stops and preset combinations, and attempting to learn the pedals.

I learned that it takes more than 2 days. Maybe next time.

Basically, I can play the pedals, but the accuracy leaves something to be desired, as does the tempo. So unless I wanted everyone to sing funeral durges while cringing at my random bass line, I decided to leave it to the manuals.

And I did fine. It was pretty fun, actually. When I got nervous, my hands got a little sweaty, and then they started slipping and missing notes. That wasn't good. But I doubt many people noticed.

As for the title of my post, it was a very sad day today.

Yesterday morning when Kevin and I went on a walk over to the nature center by where we live, we let Howie play outside.

And that's the last time we've seen him.

Now, if this were Toby, I wouldn't be terribly worried, since Toby has common sense. Howie, on the other hand, has no sense of direction and no sense at all. He may be out playing in someone's backyard. He may be smashed in the street somewhere. He could be stuck in a tree. Kevin thinks he probably ran up to someone, purred, and flopped over so they could rub his belly and take him into their home. Whatever the case may be, he is gone.

Toby is really lonely without him, and he whines at us a lot. I don't blame him. I miss Howie too.

We walk around the neighborhood every couple hours, and we put up some signs this morning. This afternoon it rained, so I'll have to do it again tomorrow.

I really miss the little guy, and seeing as how we came upon him by finding him stuck in a tree, I really don't doubt his getting into trouble. If he were coming home, I think he would have made it back already, being hungry and lonely or something.

I still hope he makes it back, and I check out our windows all the time to see him come prancing out of the bushes without a care in the world. And I really hope it happens. He's a sweetie pie. And so soft! And incredibly affectionate and appreciative. We all miss him so much!

Pain

So taking childbirth classes really makes me think about pain.

On The Office, when they're all trying to lose weight over the summer, Andy Bernard admits to the camera, "This is the HARDEST thing I've had to do in my LIFE.... I haven't had a very hard life."

I remember when I got my ears pierced, they pierced one of them, and holy cow! that was some major stinging! The reason I remember this is because the helpful lady with the earring gun told me oh-so-kindly, "Come on, it doesn't hurt that bad. Just try to think of a time when something hurt worse." Um, I'm sorry. When something hurts, even if it's just tiny and stinging, it's just about impossible to think of another time when something else hurt worse.
But I think, up to this point in my life, the most painful thing I've ever endured was when I broke my leg in China. The initial break hurt, and then for the next several days, it was a deep, aching, intense pain. But the worst part of it was when I went to the doctor's and they put a cast on it. They wrapped it up in the cool, wet plaster, which felt pretty good, and then they squeezed my leg, trying to set the bone back in place. Um, it wasn't even out of place; it was just a crack. But they felt it necessary. I asked my dad if they usually give you pain medication before they do that in the States. He thought I was crazy, because they don't even do that in the States. It hurt so bad, it felt like they had somehow accessed my tear ducts through my ankle and were squeezing them out. I wasn't crying, but the pain was just so intense the tears just came out.
So maybe when I have a baby in the next few weeks, I'll be able to take the helpful piercing lady's advice and just remember some other pain, telling myself this isn't so bad.
Or I'll just opt for an epidural.

Merriment on Independence Day

Yay for the Fourth of July! Although nothing compares to spending it in White Rock or with family, we did have quite a fun day.
First we went to the Boise parade. Since we live fairly close to downtown, we were able to just walk. And if you could see me and how far I care to walk these days, you'll know exactly HOW close we live.
We found a spot on the grass in the shade to sit and watch. My favorite bits of the parade were the Scottish bagpipes, drums, and dancers. Then there was a Korean group playing drums and wearing beautiful Korean garb. And then there was a group from the Hari Krishna temple singing, drumming, and playing bells. It was great!
Sadly, the traditionally American parade entries were pale and boring in comparison. Oh, there were beauty queens in convertibles, a Model T club, and several veterans' groups-- including a Medal of Honor winner from WWII. Okay, so that was awesome. And then a lawn and garden company had "Weed Man" who would run around and spray people with his water gun. So the American entries weren't too shabby. They were just overshadowed by the awesome international entries. And there was no band.
In the afternoon, once we'd frozen enough ice over the course of the past two days, we made some ice cream. It's not very responsible of us to make a whole gallon of rich chocolate ice cream and not invite anyone over to share. But that's what you have to do when you don't really know anyone in town.

Here is my awesome husband icing the icecream maker. And you can see our awesome-but-tiny kitchen.

Then for fireworks, we drove up towards Bogus Basin and climbed up this random hill that the owner has removed all natural vegetation and planted.... bluegrass. Seriously. Every time we drive (or Kevin rides his bike) by, there are HUGE sprinklers on, and it's always freshly mowed. And it's like 10 acres. Of grass. In the desert. How stupid.
But it made a nice place to watch fireworks.

One benefit to being huge

Walking in the supermarket, I just walk straight, and Kevin follows with the basket in my wake. It's amazing that even while everyone's mobbing the grocery store in preparation for the 4th of July, we still find a clear path (or at least a path that clears) everywhere we go!

Productive

Yesterday I got a ton done. I did laundry, ran errands (library, hardware store, groceries), and baked bread (in the bread maker). I practiced the piano, and I even updated my blog with that lovely music playlist you see to the right. And I put it on top so you can turn it off without having to search my entire blog to find the stupid button.
I did a bunch of cooking: I boiled eggs for snacks, I baked pumpkin muffins at 4 in the afternoon (remind me sometime how that's the hottest time of the day. I seem to forget), and later went swimming with Kevin. Which is not cooking, but it was just part of that sentence.
Man! I got so much done!
Contrast today: I went to the doctor. Yup, still pregnant. I went to our ward's playgroup, even though I don't have kids. I noticed I wasn't the only one who didn't have playground-aged kids, but sometimes when you're a stay-at-home mom (especially one who doesn't have kids yet) you just want to go be social.
I came home and ate lunch, put together our baby swing (thank you Cherisse and Ryan, for bringing it by last night on your way to Washington at 1 AM!).
Then I took a nap for the rest of the afternoon.
Kevin came home from work, we ate dinner, and now he is taking a nap. Maybe this has something to do with our fly-by-night guests that stopped by in the wee hours and wouldn't stay even though we requested that they do so.
It's okay, though. They brought us a baby swing and a highchair (the exact kind we wanted and registered for... mostly because we liked theirs).
So if any of you are planning to drive through Boise any time soon, please bring gifts. We may even feed you pumpkin muffins at 2 AM. :)