I’d always heard “the hospital is the last place you can get rest”, but it’d been many years since I was actually a patient in the hospital. That was most certainly the case the day after delivering B.
Once B was in the room, it seemed the door became a revolving one with everyone in and out of our room. We had a visit from one of the lactation consultants, one of the pediatrician’s from the practice we selected stopped by to provide a report that everything looked good during B’s first check-up, and of course our family members were dying to spend some time with the little guy.
Josh’s mom, Granny, and Granny’s husband all stopped by to see, hold, and take pictures of B, since it was a late night and they didn’t get a chance to spend much time with us.
B and his Gran
B and his Great Granny
As they were leaving, Josh’s dad came in for a visit.
B, Pops, and Josh
While he was here, the hospital photographer came by to take pictures and attempt to sell us a package. We’d been planning on taking photos with Mini Photo Sessions, so we let them take pictures, but had no intention of buying. We told her we’d think about it after she went through the ridiculous pricing options, and she went on her way. Side note, they asked for our email address to send us the link to view the slideshow, and at the same time opted me in to their Mom365 database for emails…which I get almost every other day…
After the photographer left, we spent a little more time with Josh’s dad before my parents arrived. My mom was dying to “hold the baby” and my dad was rocking a “Proud Grandpa” hat – they’d been waiting for this moment for YEARS.
B and his Nanny
Grandpa and B
Not too long after they arrived, another doctor came in to tell us they were ready to take B back for a procedure. Josh had walked his dad out, so he wasn’t around, but he made it back just before the nurse came to get B. Since B wasn’t in the room, my parents and J decided to go get food. I thought I’d take the opportunity to pump, since no one was around.
Within 7 minutes (while I’m pumping mind you), the following people knocked on and attempted to enter the room:
- Flower delivery (guy actually tried to come into the room until I firmly asked him to just leave the flowers on the floor by the door)
- Lunch service (I asked if they could come back in 5 minutes)
- Environmental Services (to clean the room)
- The hospital photographer (that couldn’t take a hint we didn’t want the photos)
- One of my nurses
I couldn’t believe how many people were attempting to get into the room at once, and of course when I obviously wanted some privacy!
After all of that, while Josh and my parents are still gone, the nurses come back to tell me that they’re going to take out my catheter (which they said they’d do after I ate lunch….which didn’t come back in 5 minutes, so now I’m tired AND hungry – not a good combination). I brought up that I hadn’t eaten yet, and one of the nurses commented that I’d sent my lunch away – which was so not true. They promised to bring me my food after we finished.
I won’t go into the gory details of the removal, but I did not enjoy the process of standing up for the first time in 24 hours after having a c-section. It was hard and it hurt! I just wanted to lay back down. While we were taking care of the catheter, my parents and Josh returned and were waiting in the hallway when a friend of mine came for a quick visit.
When I was crawling back into bed, my IV in my hand came out and started leaking. It wasn’t in solidly to begin with as they hit a wall in my vein the day before, but I’d been curving my hand to make sure it flowed correctly – no big deal. Well, they informed me that they couldn’t just take it out since I still was attached to an epidural providing me fluids – they had to start a new IV, that I’d keep for 4 hours. *shakes head*
While the new IV was being introduced to my left arm, B came back to the room after his procedure. They were explaining to Josh how to care for B, and I wasn’t able to pay attention. They’d also just brought my lunch to my room, but I couldn’t eat since I was in the middle of getting a new IV. And it was at that moment I lost it.
Yes, I completely lost it. All of the above had taken place before 2 pm, and I was going on maybe 3 hours of sleep. I was in pain. I was exhausted. I was tired of being poked and prodded. I was tired of having my blood pressure taken what felt like every hour. I was tired of people coming into my room when I just wanted to rest! I broke down into tears. Poor Josh was trying to pay attention to B and the nurse while I was having my breakdown. I felt bad that I was feeling this way, but I couldn’t help it.
My nurse offered to put a do not disturb sign on my door, and I took her up on it. My parents decided to leave, and I apologized for being in such a bad mood. I took some pain medication and took a nap. It was definitely great to get some sleep, I woke up feeling MUCH better.
My friend Monica stopped by to visit B and brought some snacks along with her. She ended up leaving right before dinner arrived.
B with Aunt Monica
The rest of the evening was peaceful in comparison to the earlier part of the day. Josh and I spent some time with B before we decided to send him to the nursery for the night. While I’d had a chance to nap, Josh really hadn’t, so we both decided to try and get a good night’s sleep after a very busy day.
Now that it’s been a little over two weeks, I’ve finally had a chance to sit down and write out the events of B’s birthday. That and my mom is here, currently holding the little fella, which makes it easier to get on the computer and type it all out! It’s a bit long, so be warned!
After all of our waiting, it appeared that B was not going to come on his own. My doctor’s office would only let me go to 41 weeks, so when I was 4 days away from 41 weeks, I called and requested that we go ahead and scheduled an induction for January 23rd (40 weeks/5 days). At my last appointment I was already dilated to 4 cm, and 75% effaced – well on my way, so they felt the induction would be favorable.
I crawled into bed on the 22nd with every intention of going to sleep early. It was hard to fathom going to bed with just two of us in the house, knowing that the next time we’d come home, there would be three. Due to excitement, nerves, and adrenaline, there was no way I was falling asleep any time soon. Josh however, fell asleep with no problem. His snoring might have had something to do with me not being able to sleep too. 😉 So instead I decided to write in my journal and write Josh a letter that I wanted to give him at the hospital the next day. He didn’t hear me moving around at all.
On the morning of the 23rd, I received a phone call from the hospital at 6 am requesting that I report to the hospital at 7:45 am. At that point, I really regretted not making a conscious effort to force myself to go to sleep. There was no telling how long the day was going to be! We got up, took our final belly photo, I ate a bowl of cereal for breakfast and had a little juice before getting into the car and making our way to the hospital.
40 weeks, 5 days!
We checked in around 7:50 am, and shortly thereafter were taken back to our Labor & Delivery room. After some initial paperwork and preparation, I got my IV around 9:45 am. The Pitocin was started around that time as well. My contractions were being monitored, but if I weren’t hooked up to a monitor, I wouldn’t have even realized I was having them. It was crazy!
My parents got to the hospital around 11 am, and Josh’s family got there about 30-40 minutes later. We were able to spend some time with them all once they arrived. Around noon, my midwife came in to check my progress, so everyone left the room. I was still at 4 cm, so they decided to break my water to see if they could speed up and help intensify the contractions.
I was pretty tired and wanted to take a nap, so all the family members went to the waiting room after lunch so I could nap. The contractions were starting to get uncomfortable, but they weren’t painful just yet, so I opted not to get the epidural right away and went with the Fentanyl at 12:30 pm. I wasn’t quite expecting the room to start spinning, but it did! The first dose wore off after about an hour, so I got a second dose at 2 pm and fell asleep. I woke up at 3 pm to the contractions being really uncomfortable! It was at that point I decided I was ready to get the epidural.
Because I had to have a full bag of fluids before I got the epidural, I wasn’t able to get it until about 4 pm. The relief was pretty instantaneous. Fifteen minutes later, the midwife came in and checked my progress and I was at 7 cm, and about 75% effaced. While progress was being made, B was still pretty high up in there and not moving towards making an exit. The midwife said she’d come back a little later to see how things were going.
At 6 pm, the midwife came back for another check and I was at 9 cm, but B was still very high and had not made any effort to descend. She started discussing the potential need for a c-section to get him out, which brought me to tears. It was not something we’d planned on, and since the pregnancy had been so easy, I didn’t even think that it would have been an option unless something bad was happening. I wasn’t ready to make the call, so the midwife said she’d come back at 7 pm for a final check before we’d make any decisions about next steps.
Unfortunately, at 7 pm the results of the check were exactly the same. The doctor came in, reviewed everything, and agreed that we needed to proceed with the c-section. At 7:20 pm, one of the nurses came in and said that we had an operating room reserved for 7:45 pm. I couldn’t believe how quickly everything started happening. They prepped me for surgery and got Josh in his outfit for surgery. He ran all of our belongings out to the waiting room and gave our family members the news that it was go time!
Ready to head to the operating room
They wheeled me down to Operating Room #1, where they took me inside and had Josh wait outside until they were ready for him to come in. All I could focus on was the fact that I was shaking uncontrollably from the epidural and could not stop! My jaws were so clinched and sore from trying to control the shakes. Finally, Josh was able to come in and held my right hand behind the curtain shielding us from the c-section.
Once the procedure started, I was more alert as to what was going on in the room. The doctor talked to us the entire time, asking us about what we did for a living, among other things, just to keep us engaged and to keep us from focusing on the surgery. Josh did a fantastic job the entire day, and it was helpful having him there holding my hand. Thankfully the anesthesiologist offered to take pictures for us during the whole process.
B making his grand entrance into the world! Photo courtesy of our anesthesiologist!
At 8:04 pm, our little fella was born. We heard him cry, and they held him up over the curtain for us to see him. He was HUGE! There wasn’t a scale in the room, he was to be weighed in the recovery room, but we knew he was pretty big just looking at him. And he had so much hair! Once they had him wrapped up, we took a few family photos and then Josh went with him to the recovery room while they closed me up.
First family photo!
I made it into the recovery room around 8:45 pm or so (time really escaped me that night!) and I found out that B was 9 lbs 10 oz!!! No wonder he didn’t want to make the normal arrival! Because I was still shaking so badly, I couldn’t easily hold B, which really upset me. The minute the shakes were manageable though, he was in my arms! Once I started holding him, Josh was able to text friends/family pictures/details and post about B’s arrival on Facebook. 😉
I was so incredibly thirsty, not having had anything to drink for awhile, and I was starting to get a little hungry seeing that I hadn’t eaten since 7 am! But because I’d had surgery, I wasn’t able to eat solid foods for 12 hours after the c-section, which meant I couldn’t eat until 8:04 am the next day.
We left the recovery room around 10:30 pm when we were moved to our hospital room. We went over paperwork and initial details with the nurse on duty, started feeding B for the first time, and then told our family members where they could find us around 11:15 pm. Everyone came in for a quick visit, but we were all tired from the long day, so they ended up heading back to their hotels for the night around 11:30-11:45 pm.
After that, Josh and I were able to spend some time with B alone, which was great. We were immediately completely in love with him. I couldn’t get out of the bed, so Josh was on diaper duty from the start. We were hoping to get some sleep after everyone left, but we ended up staying awake with a fussy baby until about 3:45 am. It was at that point we made the decision to let B go to the nursery for the rest of the night. I was completely exhausted, and we just needed a little rest. It was a hard decision to make, because we really wanted him there with us, but knew we wouldn’t be in a good spot if neither of us were without sleep the next day.
All in all, it was a long, tiring day, but it was completely worth it. Knowing how big of a baby B was after the fact made the c-section perfectly acceptable in my mind. To this day I’m so glad that he didn’t even attempt to descend, because it could have been a much different birthing experience!
Once things calm down a bit more, I’ll update again! Just wanted to share B’s birth story since several people had asked!
So today marks 40 weeks and 2 days of me being pregnant. That’s 282 days.
I can’t lie, in comparison to other pregnancies that I’ve heard about and that my friends have experienced – I had it pretty easy.
No morning sickness, no major issues, no gestational diabetes, no high blood pressure, I was able to sleep through the night most of the time, and my bladder of steel carried on through the entire pregnancy (except for recently – but only when I’m awake, night time is still golden). I’m lucky, and I realize that.
I’m also lucky that I’m in this position. And I think that’s been in the back of my mind the entire pregnancy, which has made the little discomforts that I have experienced seem pretty insignificant. How could I complain about this blessing?
The offer to induce has been made a couple times lately, especially with this pregnancy rash that I have (which has been more tolerable with the prescription they gave me!), but I’ve turned them down. I won’t have much of a choice this week, as they won’t let me go later than Friday the 25th (41 weeks).
Josh and I went out to lunch for Mexican today (another rumored old-wives tale attempt for getting labor going on its own – since the Eggplant Parmigiana at Scalini’s didn’t help!), and it dawned on us that this will really be the very last weekend we have together without a baby. Wow. The anticipation is killing us – but after being told that “they baby could be here any day” twice at doctor’s appointments since the 9th – we’re just ready to stop waiting! We’re really excited to meet our little guy. He’s seemingly stubborn like his mom, and he’s quite content with his little bubble inside the womb. Since there’s a big football game this weekend (Go Falcons!), I know Josh is glad that we’ll be able to watch the game on a big screen versus watching the game on a tiny hospital TV, but we really thought he’d be here by now! Who knows, maybe the stress of the game will help bring him on? I’ll keep my fingers crossed.
The phone calls and texts have started asking us for updates on how things are going, if the baby is here yet, etc., and my phone literally comes close to dying by 7 pm every evening. We are appreciative of the thoughts and concern, but it makes me chuckle a little. When have Josh and I ever been quiet about what’s going on and not posted things online or kept people in the loop? 🙂 When the time comes and there’s something to report, I keep assuring them, they’ll know!
I wouldn’t say I’m the most patient person in the world, but I feel this is one of the first lessons of being a parent. Patience. One of many lessons to come, and I look forward to learning. This whole process is going to be a learning experience, and I feel like I’m going into it completely clueless and unprepared. I guess that just means I’ll have to learn as I go. 🙂
But for now…we wait.
I’ve professed my love for Google Analytics before, that hasn’t changed since my last post recapping blog stats! I really do enjoy watching the visitors come to this blog, seeing where they’re from, what posts are being read, etc.
The map that shows the physical locations of visitors is one of my favorites. It’s cool seeing all of the countries people are reading my blog from throughout the year:
Visitors from all over! 84 Countries in all!
It’s also cool seeing visitors from almost every state in the US (with the exception of Maine and Wyoming – so if you know anyone that lives in either of those states share the link, my goal for 2013 is to have someone from there visit the blog!)
US Visitors
Since I love taking a look at Google Analytics, I wanted to run the numbers for 2012, to keep going with my previous post on 2010 and 2011’s results.
Here are the blog stats year over year:
2012:
– Total Site Visits: 3,133 Visits
– Unique Site Visitors: 2,178 Unique Visitors
– Total Posts Written: 54 [crossed off #34 from my Life List!]
– Total Page Views: 4,913 Page views
– Average Page Views per Visit: 1.57 Pages/Visit
– Avg. Visit Duration: 1:12
2011:
– Total Site Visits: 1,714 Visits
– Unique Site Visitors: 1,272 Unique Visitors
– Total Posts Written: 30
– Total Page Views: 2,679 Page views
– Average Page Views per Visit: 1.56 Pages/Visit
– Avg. Visit Duration: 1:26
2010:
– Total Site Visits: 234 Visits
– Unique Site Visitors: 177 Unique Visitors
– Total Posts Written: 7
– Total Page Views: 384 Page views
– Average Page Views per Visit: 1.64 Pages/Visit
– Avg. Visit Duration: 1:30
And last but not least, the Top 5 Posts in 2012 (in case you weren’t around to see ’em the first time!):
1. Dear Overstock (201 views / 162 unique)
2. Life List #14 (Part 1): 1+1 = 3? (163 views / 154 unique)
3. Certain Shades of Green (147 views / 109 unique)
4. A Place to Lay His Head (103 views / 93 unique)
5. Our Love Story (99 views / 92 unique)
Thanks to everyone that has stopped by my little ol’ blog (and those that continue to stop by)! I hope that 2013 will bring higher numbers and that I’ll have some worthwhile things to write about. 2013 is looking like it’ll be a good one!
Happy New Year!!!
At the beginning of 2012, I stated I wasn’t going to do a resolution, but I was going to define 2012 with one word: life. This year I’ve made a conscious effort to enjoy the present, the now, and I think I’ve been successful in doing so.
2012 has been a fantastic year, so fantastic, it feels like it’s just flown by! Since it’s the end of the year, I wanted to do a recap of the top 12 highlights of the year for me, most of which have posts that are associated with them. For the ones that don’t, I’ve written a little blurb to fill you in. 😉
1. Rang in 2012 in Sydney (and crossed #13 on my Life List)
2. Bought our first house (and hopefully only one, moving sucks! Also #27 on the Life List)
3. Mercer beat Kennesaw State…again.
4. The Beta Sigma chapter of Alpha Delta Pi celebrated 75 years
5. Josh and I celebrated our third anniversary
6. There was a mini 409 GTG
7. We found out we were expecting a baby!
8. We celebrated Josh’s 30th birthday in Vegas – [Day 1 / Day 2 / Day 3 ]
9. We went to the PGA Championship at The Ocean Course, Kiawah Island, SC [Aug 9 – 12]
On August 1st, Josh tells me he scored tickets to the PGA Championship, and all I can think of is “Where on earth are we going to stay?!” The planner in me knew that it would be difficult to find accommodation, and I *really* didn’t want to stay in Charleston and fight traffic getting onto Kiawah. I searched high and low for every potential option in the book. I contacted approximately 15-20 different rental units, all that ended up being full – or wouldn’t take a reservation for less than 7 days. I eventually found St. Christopher Camp and Conference Center that had relatively cheap boarding on Seabrook Island, that would allow us to stay in the Kiawah/Seabrook area without having to fight traffic leaving or getting onto the Island. Talk about luck!
Our tickets for the weekend!
The Championship was a lot of fun! We got to see our favorite golfers play, which was fun. Adam Scott totally smiled at me (ask Josh, he witnessed it)! It made all the stress of finding a place to stay and getting there worth it. To be honest, there may or may not have been a hysterical, crazy hormonal breakdown during the process of finding accommodation, taking off work, and the drive to SC. 😉
Josh had a great time and The Ocean Course was beautiful (at least what we saw of it!). Seeing that it was hot, and I was 17 weeks pregnant, I didn’t feel like walking the entire course, especially since it was *so* spread out. Thankfully Josh was cool with picking a couple holes near the main entrance and sticking to those. And thank goodness for The Masters chairs we purchased earlier in the year – they came in handy!
All in all, the weekend was great, and we were able to visit the stretch of beach on Seabrook where Josh proposed 4 years ago. 🙂
Just a few feet away from where I said “Yes!” when Josh proposed in 2008
10. Spent a long weekend in San Francisco for our babymoon
11. We found out we are having a baby boy
12. Weddings Galore!! Carla & Rich / MFP & Tony / Blake & Kisha
This year, we had some awesome people in our lives get married, and we were so happy to celebrate along with them!
Carla and Rich got married towards the end of September, Josh was one of Rich’s groomsmen. The ceremony and reception were beautiful, and I was so happy to be there to witness it all. I will always take some partial credit for them meeting (since I got Carla the job where she met Rich), even if I was a little unsure of them dating at first. Glad Rich turned out to be an awesome guy!
Rich and Carla
With the newlyweds
One of my BFFs, MFP got married at the end of September as well to Tony, who she met in Medical School (I was the Matron of Honor). They’ve been together since the fall of 2005, and gone through medical school and residency together. I was ecstatic when Tony proposed to MFP and couldn’t wait to celebrate their marriage in Savannah, one of the most beautiful places I could think to get married! MFP was a beautiful bride!
With the beautiful bride!
With MFP and the Tonester!
Then in October, Josh’s brother married his fiance, Kisha and they had a celebration for friends and family in their hometown. Seeing Blake with Kisha has been a real treat, and I’m so glad that he found someone that makes him happy! I look forward to getting to know Kisha over the coming years and can’t wait to celebrate the arrival of their little boy in 2013!
The couple seated at the head table
With the happy couple!
So those have been my favorite moments of 2012, what were yours? And if you happen to write a post highlighting your year, please comment and share the link! I’d love to read your recap of the year!!
Here’s to a wonderful 2013!
[#54 of #52]
[Read about Day 1 here]
Since I didn’t eat much for dinner the night before, I was starving when we woke up! We ordered room service breakfast after realizing there were no places we could quickly/easily walk to from the hotel (as we learned the night before).
We had tickets to the afternoon Braves / Giants game, so we decided to hang out in the room before grabbing a cab to head down to AT&T Park. We got there early, before the gates opened, as we wanted to watch batting practice, and potentially get a few autographs from our favorite Braves players.
Josh in front of AT&T Park
We had excellent seats, so we were certain that we’d get close to some of the players.
View from our seats
Apparently they had different plans.
The players didn’t take batting practice that day. Wha?? We were able to watch a few warm up on the field, but nothing really exciting.
Early practice on the field
Needless to say, we were kind of bummed. However, we met a couple from California that were huge Braves fans, who were really excited about seeing Chipper Jones play in his final season. To add to the batting practice disappointment, Chipper wasn’t playing in the game. Their other favorite player was Brian McCann, who also wasn’t playing in the game. They were quite jealous when they found out we were from Atlanta and could see them any time we wanted. It was fun talking with the other fans, who were also upset there was little Braves action on the field before the game.
While we were standing around waiting for the game to start, there was a “Dog Days of Summer” dog parade around the field, and there was one dog dressed up in Braves gear!
Dog parade around the park
They only allow dogs in the park once a year, which we discussed that Turner Field does “Bark in the Park” often.
After the parade was close to finishing, players started coming out on the field to warm up.
David Ross and other players warming up
We made a sign trying everything we could to get the players to come over and autograph something, but it didn’t work either. We did get a few smiles, but that’s about it.
Baby’s First Game
Wanting to try a signature food from the stadium, we asked some locals what the one thing they’d recommend we get to eat, and it we received the same answer from everyone – the garlic fries. Even some members of the Braves coaching staff decided to try them out. Josh went to go get lunch and fries, while I saved our seats.
Awesome garlic fries!
The baseball game started and it was awesome being right next to the field.
Another view from our seats
What was even more awesome was a Braves win!
Braves win!
Since we didn’t walk around the park much before the game (hoping we’d get to see the players) we walked around afterwards. It really is a beautiful park in a great spot by the water!
Josh with the park in the background
As we took a cab down to the stadium, we had no defined way of getting back to our hotel. There were no free cabs to be found once we made our way out onto the street, so we decided to walk a couple blocks to try and pick one up there. No dice. We walked to the hotel Josh was staying in for the conference to try and pick up a taxi there, and that idea didn’t work out either – traffic was terrible! So we kept walking, and kept walking, and kept walking. And then we were at the intersection of Kearny and California, looking up the hill that led to our hotel. I was tired and I did NOT want to walk up the slope. I saw a taxi and *was* very tempted to ask it to take us up the hill, but Josh thought that was a silly idea.
So we walked, and stopped, and walked, and stopped, and walked, and stopped, and walked until we finally made it to the hotel.
Since we were both pretty tired, we relaxed in the hotel room and decided to order room service again (because it’s just SO much easier sometimes). Josh got a burger, I got pizza, and we may or may not have ordered an ice cream sundae. And I may or may not have eaten most of it. 😉
Room service for the win!
The rest of the night consisted of watching TV and being lazy. We had plans to head back out to explore on our last day in San Francisco.
[#53 of #52] – I accomplished one of my goals on my life list!!
Josh was asked to speak at a Social Media conference at the end of August in San Francisco, and since I’d always wanted to go to SF, I suggested that he make a long weekend out of the trip and we do an early babymoon (at 19 weeks). We talked about it as a possibility, but in looking at the Atlanta Braves schedule, it just so turned out that they were playing in San Francisco that weekend – decision made!
Arrival & Day 1:
I flew out after work on Thursday and met him in his hotel room. The flight out was rough – I’m not a fan of turbulence! By the time I got to the city from the airport it was late and I was exhausted, so we called it a night pretty early. The next morning we checked out of the hotel he’d been staying in and transferred our belongings over to the InterContinental Hotel – Mark Hopkins, thanks to the Friends & Family discount from a good friend. 😉
Hotel Sign
Hotel Exterior
Pic of our room
Bathroom
Once we were settled in the hotel, we found the trolley and went down to Fisherman’s Wharf to explore. Getting there was somewhat of an ordeal, but we eventually made it!
At Fisherman’s Wharf
We had lunch at No. 9 Fishermen’s Grotto, and it was very good! We ordered calamari for an appetizer, and I had the Boston clam chowder, while Josh had the Bay Shrimp Sandwich. We were both satisfied with our options, and quite full after we finished!
Calamari
Boston Clam Chowder
Bay Shrimp Sandwich
We continued walking around, checked out some of the gift shops, and made our way down to see the seals.
On the recommendation of a vendor that I work with for one of my clients, we just *had* to get an ice cream sundae from Ghirardelli. It was late in the afternoon, and I knew there was a chance I’d ruin dinner with one, but I didn’t really care, so we stopped at the “On-the-Go” location. Surprisingly, Josh didn’t want any, so I had it all to myself!
Woo hoo!
The amazing sundae!
If you’re asking, it was totally worth ruining dinner to enjoy one of these bad boys.
Later that night we decided to walk to a nearby restaurant to get something to eat. Based on recommendations on Foursquare, we went to Sanraku. It was PACKED! Since we didn’t think it was a place that would require a reservation, we opted to do take-out and walk back to the hotel. What I didn’t mention is that we walked 4-5 blocks downhill to this restaurant, which meant we had to walk UP that massive hill to get back to the hotel. I may or may not have cursed under my breath (that I was out of) the whole way back.
We had dinner and called it a night – we wanted to get down to the San Francisco Giants‘ AT&T Park early on Saturday before the baseball game, so we needed to get some rest!
[#52 of #52]
So I realize this post is WAY behind, but I felt compelled to finish the trip write up out – since it’s been sitting in my drafts since I first wrote about our Vegas trip [Day 1 / Day 2]. Plus, it’s the day we really celebrated the reason went to Vegas (Josh’s 30th), so it needs to be posted! Seeing that I have a few days off of work, I figure now’s the best time to finish up some posts!
On our last full day in Vegas, we decided that we were going to sleep in. Why stop with the sleeping now? It’d been a big part of our trip already, haha. Josh ended up going downstairs to get breakfast for us from the little cafe in the hotel, which was quite good. Once we’d eaten we decided that a lazy day by the pool was in order.
Vdara’s pool was fairly small, but it’s a nice area. Seeing that it was July, it was HOT outside. The building also has a crazy amount of reflection from the sun that appears on everyone below in the pool area. We grabbed the first set of chairs we could find, as they were pretty full, but quickly realized there was NO way we’d hang out on them for very long due to the heat. We hit the pool, and as soon as we saw some chairs open up with umbrellas around them, we made a made dash for them! It certainly helped to get out of the sun. Everyone was ordering food around us, and it looked quite delicious.
After spending a good amount of time being lazy by the pool, we started thinking about what to do for dinner. We stopped by the concierge to see if we could get reservation at Gordon Ramsey’s new restaurant in Paris, but since it had just opened, there was no way we’d get in before 9 pm! So, we went with a recommendation by the concierge to eat at Mastro’s Ocean Club. He made reservations for us, and we made our way back up to the room to take a nap (again with the sleeping…going to Vegas while pregnant is definitely different!).
Our afternoon was lazy, but then we started getting ready to head to dinner. Taking the tram to Crystals we arrived a little before our reservation, but we were seated pretty quickly in the “treehouse” section of the restaurant.
Exterior view of the “treehouse”
View looking up from our table in the “treehouse”
Our waiter went over the menu, made recommendations, and gave us a few minutes to determine what we wanted to order.
The menu
Everything on the menu looked absolutely delicious! We each settled on a steak, especially after we were told they heat the plates so that the steak continues to sizzle as they bring it out to the table. I opted for mashed potatoes and asparagus as my sides, both were phenomenal. It was by far the best meal we had the entire trip!
My delicious dinner
Our waiter asked if we wanted dessert, but we were so full we decided to pass. Plus, I wanted to get gelato again, and we had plans to gamble after dinner, so we were ready to head out. But before the check arrived, our waiter brought out Mastro’s Signature Warm Butter Cake.
The birthday boy!
Holy. Crap.
Not only could you taste the butter in the cake, but it came with an ungodly amount of whipped cream to go along with it.
Lots and lots of whipped cream!
Seriously, who could eat THAT much whipped cream?!
We put a pretty good dent in the cake. I’m not really one to pass up free dessert, especially when it’s delicious!
The aftermath!
After dinner, we took the tram back to the Bellagio to play on the slots…and perhaps get some gelato even though we’d devoured the butter cake. We just so happened to come out as the sun was going down and the sky was just so beautiful!
Beautiful post-dinner sunset
Inside the Bellagio, Josh fared much better than I while gambling (this can be said for the entire trip too – but I figured that was going to be the case). I didn’t do so well the last time I was in Vegas, so I was gun shy to waste money that I’d be happy to use elsewhere. 😉 Once the smell of the cigarette smoke really started getting to me, we decided it was time to head back to the room to hang out for the evening.
And of course, we stopped for gelato on the way back to the room… 😉
The next morning we slept in, packed up, and made our way to the airport to head home. Was quite happy that after our weekend in Vegas, we had a day off to follow – to celebrate ON Josh’s actual birthday. All in all it was a pretty good trip, and I look forward to our next trip to Vegas (and hope that I won’t be pregnant when we go!). 😉
[#51 of #52]
I don’t know about you, but I hate my email inbox being assaulted by brands. Clearly, I had enough of Overstock.com to write a post about them not too long ago. I wasn’t sure that I’d ever find a brand that was worse.
Well, I did.
As I’ve discussed before, we’re expecting a little boy come January, so as part of all that fun we setup a registry with Babies “R” Us, and I said, “Sure, send me emails!” thinking I’d get emails from Babies “R” Us (BRU), which I do, but I also started getting emails for Toys “R” Us (TRU). At first, it was kind of annoying, but I just deleted them as they came in. I mean really, I don’t even have a child yet, and while a Dip ‘n Dots Ice Cream Maker might be cool to have (you know I love my ice cream), getting emails about it and other toys for kids aren’t really applicable for my current situation.
I decided to do a little experiment right around Black Friday when I realized I was getting multiple emails from both BRU and TRU in a day. I went back to my deleted emails and restored them, and filed them away with a BRU/TRU tag in Gmail. I wanted to know exactly how many emails I received from them in the month of November.
The answer to this question is: 82. Yes, EIGHTY TWO.
In 30 days.
WHA????
Here’s the breakdown of #’s of emails sent by brand:
Ridiculous number of emails sent in November…
And here’s a table breaking down the number of emails per brand by day:
Breakdown of the 82 emails from BRU & TRU (Note the 6 emails received on Black Friday)
Now I know I have the option to opt-out, but I do want to receive the BRU emails moving forward. And while I haven’t tested it out (just yet), I’m afraid that if I opt-out, it’ll opt me out of both TRU and BRU emails, you know, because when I opted into one, I got both…
They do have a preference center where you can update your preferences, BUT, you have to create an account to do so.
Really guys? It shouldn’t be this hard to update what I want or don’t want to receive from you. What’s more annoying is that I have a registry account with the site, but that account login doesn’ t work when I try to login to update my preferences. This means that I’d have to create a DIFFERENT account just to modify my preferences. Ugh.
These sloppy steps are how brands will quickly lose subscribers, because it’s not worth jumping through hoops to modify preferences when they can easily opt-out from everything. Of course, if you aren’t bombarding your database daily, chances are you don’t have people banging on the door to stop receiving your offers/emails.
In addition to the above, I use Gmail for my personal email address. They’ve recently changed how they handle the delivery of emails. If they see that you’re not opening or just deleting emails from a particular sender over and over again, they start automatically putting them in your Spam folder. Smart email? I think so. I looked in my Spam folder today and realized about 5-6 emails from TRU and BRU had ended up in my spam folder. I indicated the BRU email wasn’t spam, but left the TRU ones there to be deleted. Going to keep an eye out on this over the next few weeks to see if it continues.
Toys “R” Us, if someone internally is reading this – please feel free to share the link around, spread the word. Fix this. You really should put some kind of frequency control around your emails/messaging. Polling other parental friends, they delete your emails too – because you send too many. If you have an agency behind your marketing email calendar – fire them. Find a new one. If you’re doing this all internally, find someone that can help with your strategy. Seriously. Batch and blast is no longer the best option out there. Be smarter about what you’re doing with your subscribers!
[#50 of #52]
One of my favorite things we’ve been able to do during our pregnancy has been having an ultrasound. Seeing our baby grow over the weeks has been so very cool, especially knowing that this technology wasn’t around or as readily available when Josh and I were babies (as our mom’s like to remind us). 😉
Over the past 31 weeks, we’ve learned a couple things about B as he’s grown:
1. He likes ice cream (he hasn’t much choice on this one…).
2. He likes rap music.
3. He likes schedules. If I’m ever late in eating, he lets me know. It’s funny how on time he is when it comes to eating, being active, and sleeping. It’s like clockwork.
4. He doesn’t always like to cooperate/He’s stubborn. One might say that he gets that last one from his mama. 😉
The weekend of my baby shower earlier this month, we made plans to take my parents and Josh’s mom to Stork Vision Atlanta for a 3D/4D appt. We purchased a package back in August to determine the gender, and then to come back for the 3D/4D, and surprised our mom’s with that info at the gender reveal party we had.
Well, B decided that he wasn’t going to cooperate so his grand parents could see him. He was breech, had his arm, legs, and umbilical cord in front of his face the entire time that we were there, and was facing my spine. We got probably one to two good pictures of his face, and that was it. Stubborn, I tell ya.
B at 29 weeks
Blowing us a kiss? Or practicing his duck face? (29 weeks)
Thankfully, with the package we purchased at Stork Vision, if at any time you’re not able to have a good visual appointment, they invite you to come back for no extra charge. So that’s what we did this weekend.
We tried a different time of day (just post-lunch time, after we toured the hospital where we’ll be delivering) and crossed our fingers that B would be willing to let us see his sweet face.
And he did!
We were able to capture 70+ photos of our little dude, and while I may be a little biased, I think he’s adorable. 🙂
B at 31 weeks
Look at those cheeks! (31 weeks)
Seeing the difference from two weeks ago was amazing! He’s definitely starting to fill out, and it made everything seem so much more real! We can’t wait to meet him!
We’re 9 weeks away from our due date, give or take a few days, and it feels like there’s still so much to do! It seems like most of the big things are knocked out (or are close to being knocked out), but there’s definitely stuff left. Maybe I should start making a list…
[#49 of #52]
