Me and my Mario Andretti at the Strong Museum of Play
The Strong Museum of Play is located right in the middle of downtown Rochester NY. Its a wonderful childrens museum with some really cool exhibits. I wish it were a smidge closer to home but really, an hour or so drive isn’t too bad. Here’s their website if you want more information: http://www.strongmuseum.org/.
We took Ian last May and he had a really fun time….we’ve been meaning to get back for a while now but it just was a challenge to fit in the schedule. This weekend we happened to have some free time and I thought it would be fun to go. You know its going to be an exciting day when the big statute outside gets a “wow!!!!” as you drive past on your way into the parking lot. 🙂
We actually ended up getting a FAMILY membership now that Mr. Ian is of admission-paying age. 🙂 I figure, we need to go 2 more times this year to make the membership worthwhile. Shouldn’t be a problem because we had an AWESOME time yesterday. We ended up staying very close to 3 hours. I wish the museum opened a little earlier because its hard to get all our playing done before Ian needs a nap (and is no longer willing to behave). 🙂
We got to the museum at around 10:30am (opens at 10am) and we immediately took off for the Wegmans/grocery store exhibit. Last time we came, it was full and they weren’t letting anymore children in. We wanted to be sure to play in that section before the museum got too busy. We had a good time there and then were off to explore the rest of the museum. We checked out a bunch of exhibits but there were a lot of placed we didn’t even get to! Good thing we have a family membership, we can go back over and over.
Here are a bunch of pictures from our visit! More are on our Shutterfly website, if you’re interested.
Lots of credit to Mike for the great butterfly pictures….they really came out great!
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2567711776994368641&hl=en
Simulation racecars that you can “race” while watching the action on a big screen tv:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7911268425331563143&hl=en
Clutzy + Pregnant = Recipe for Disaster
So, I’m in the bathroom upstairs putting on makeup and getting ready for work. I hear Ian down in the living room, saying “cheese”. Now, this can mean one of two things. #1. He wants some cheese to eat (usually accompanied by whining and fit throwing if we don’t get it for him fast enough) or #2. he’s getting his picture taken. Since, Mike and I were both in the bathroom getting ready and there was NO whining going on, I had a really bad feeling he’d managed to get his hands on the P&S camera. I went downstairs, without my glasses and with my makeup in my hand, and there the little bugger was, holding the camera.
I got the camera away from him and was on my way back upstairs to finish getting ready when I managed to catch my foot on the lip of the top step. Because it happened so fast and I’m 6 months pregnant, all I was focusing on was NOT landing on my belly. I ended up falling down like a ton of bricks on the landing of our second floor on my side. I had managed to turn my body and land on my side/back of my arm/shoulder so that was good. But becauce I was so focused on NOT landing on my belly, I didn’t break my fall at all and I fell pretty hard on the hardwoods.
I’m clutzy on a good day but w/ a 10lb basketball on the front of me? Its even worse. Ugh. I didn’t have my glasses on so I’m not sure if that added to my clumsiness or not.
So, I calmed Mike down because he was freaked out. It probably sounded like a MAC truck hit the house. Not to mention, I kind slid across the floor past the openning to our bedroom. haha I finished getting ready and took Ian to moms. I had felt the baby kick a handful of times so I was really up in the air about calling the dr. Its a really busy week for me at work and I knew it was going to turn into a several hour project.
Mom thought it would be best to call (and I was starting to have doubts about not calling) so I called the dr office and got the on-call service. The OB on call at one of the local hospitals called w/in 30 mins and said that she was hesistant on how to handle because she thought everything was ok (because I was feeling movement). She told me to wait until the office opened at 9am and to call them about coming in for some monitoring.
I finally got through with the OBs office and they had me come in right away. I saw a NP and the baby sounded good (strong HB, lots of movement). I’m measuring a week ahead and had a smidge of protein in my urine. My BP was a little elavated but pretty much within my normal range.
She asked an U/S tech to squeeze me in for a quick U/S to check that everything looked ok. The U/S tech said all looked good. She switched over to 3D/4D mode (which I’ve never had done before) and I got ot see the baby’s face. I wish Mike could have been there too. It was the coolest thing to see!
My next appt is next Tuesday when I’ll have my 1hr glucose test. I’m interested to see what the BP and urine results look at. This was the first time I’ve had protein in my urine….
So, to recap:
I’m a complete dumbass, the baby is beautiful and I got to work 3 hours late.
Here are a few of the U/S pictures!!! They didn’t upload/scan in as clear at they are in real life but they’re really cool to look like. The baby kinda has its left hand/arm beside its face.
Looks like Ian is going to have a little look-alike! 🙂
that I love our new computer? I luuuuuuuuuuuuv it. 🙂
I can upload pictures in minutes. Minutes, my friends!!!
That may not sound like a big deal but it was taking anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 HOURS to upload pictures. AAAAAHHHH!!!
If you know ANYTHING about me, I’m soooo not patient. Having a computer that does what I want, when I want and as fast as I want? PRICELESS!
Because I can upload so fast and I have a nice case of pregnancy insomnia, here are two shots from last night….
Ian playing in tub
(Let this moment go down in history as the “First Time I Used My Camera In Manual Mode”. Purely accidental that I got anything that could remotely be labeled a “good shot”. Mike was getting Ian’s attention and I snapped a picture. The most important thing to note: Ian is in FOCUS! 🙂 The light in the bathroom, as like most bathrooms, is awful so this isn’t the highest quality shot on Earth but I like it.)
My pregnant self at 27 weeks. Actually, really 26 weeks 6 days and 10 hours. But who’s counting? 🙂 Good-bye second trimester! Third trimester here we come!!!
Please excuse the goofy look on my face. Mike was acting like he was paparazzi which made me laugh…which meant the picture he captured looks a little goofy. 🙂
On a photography message board I visit, we’re doing a 52-week long challenge. The challenge was adapted from a Flickr challenge and the goal is to get in front of the camera atleast 1x per week for a shot with your kids. Great idea, isn’t it? It doesn’t really matter WHO takes the picture as long as there is a picture with you and your kids.
Since I’m usually the one taking the pictures in our household, there aren’t a ton of shots with me and Ian. I’m going to try my very best to be in a picture atleast 1x per week and post them here. Once baby #2 arrives, I’m going to try to continue with the project. I’m definitely NOT going so far as to promise 2 pictures per week and by no means am I suggesting being able to wrangle a 2 year old and an infant with me into 1 shot. Just a warning: one picture, maybe with 2 kids, definiltey with 1. 🙂
Anyway, here are the results of weeks #1 and #2:
Week 2:
Me and Ian hanging out at the computer after his bath. He was watching his truck video and I was trying to take a self-portrait. I don’t think this one came out too bad. 🙂
Week 1:
Me and Ian at the big monster truck show. Daddy took this shot which might be darn near the first time in a year where Ian was both LOOKING at the camera AND SMILING at the same time!!!! We had a great time at the show and can’t wait to take Ian again. He had an awesome time and loved every minute…as indicated by the hours of our lives spent watching the same 45 second videos over and over and over and over. Mental note for next time: TAKE MORE VIDEOS. TAKE LONGER VIDEOS! 🙂
