Getting Ready for the Big Day

Last Sunday I went to the Orpheum to see a Broadway musical called “Man of La Mancha”. It was a story based on Don Quixote and it was pretty decent. I got to do a little socializing with Tami and Cindy (Cindy was visiting Tami from San Francisco). It’s always interesting to hear Cindy’s dating stories (she had just gotten back from 10 days in Paris with her boyfriend—hard to not feel envious of that).

The week started with a cold that I’m pretty sure I got from Ty. Brian had a dinner with his staff so I missed Pilates that night. Then Jack threw up Wednesday night and I stayed home with him the next day and missed Pilates then. So that kind of sucked. We spent most of the week preparing for our annual Christmas party. I made Brian do a project plan last year because he would leave a lot to the last minute and then would get really stressed out. This year he made a lot of things ahead of time and so while Saturday was really busy, he was very prepared by the time the party started. Brian makes all of the fancy finger foods from scratch himself. He loves doing it every year and really takes pride in it. I made the brownie bites from scratch and put the frosting on but that was it. My job is to make sure the house is clean and to keep the boys out the way and out of the kitchen.

On Friday I had my pre-op for my surgery. I had done a lot of research—looking at photos for what I wanted. I printed them out on good photo paper. The doctor was impressed by that. The big discussion in the pre-op is definitely on the size. I told him my biggest fear was being too big and he said that a lot of women say that. He promised that he would make me look natural and normal. He is going to start with a 325 cc implant and go up from them (they can overfill them). I love this doctor—he has the perfect bedside manner and is very well reputed. My surgery is one week away and I am starting to feel more excited than nervous.
Friday night was the book club Christmas party where we do a white elephant style gift exchange with nice gifts. Last year Tracy stole my gift of four red wine glasses. This year, there was a lot more stealing going on. Someone wanted to take their own gift and Pam said that they couldn’t. Then when Kathleen wanted to steal the gift that she brought, I said she could, that she was 9 months pregnant and if she wanted to steal her own gift, then fine by me. That caused a bit of an uproar. Lisa tried to pawn off a Michael McDonald Christmas CD as part of her gift but I guilted her into taking it out. Who wants that? Frankly I think if people were allowed to steal their own gift, that people would bring better gifts. I have enough lotions and bath stuff, thank you very much. I was the last number and then Tracy was #1 which meant that she could exchange with anyone as long as the gift hadn’t been stolen more than 2 times. All of the good gifts with the exception of one had already been stolen twice so I stole that one (a box of ornaments from China) – largely because I wanted them but what made it extra delicious is that Tracy wanted them and now she couldn’t get them. Tee hee. So now we’re even after last year. Now I can’t wait for 2007 to see what happens then. The funny thing is that I didn’t need wine glasses last year and Tracy did. Now this year Tracy didn’t need ornaments but I did.

On Saturday Brian took Jack to T-ball where Jack was swinging the bat around and accidentally hit a kid in the neck. I was glad Brian was there and not me. Then I took Jack and Ty to Jill M’s house to let Brian get stuff done. Jack and Connor played OK together. Connor was having some issues sharing his stuff. Both kids went down for their nap when we got home and I went to Target for some stuff for the party. That was a big mistake. Target was very crowded and I got grumpy trying to find anything. Nothing was where it should be and I think for just about every thing I needed, I took the very last one (thin black socks, light bulb, wreath hanger, round candles…). It took me like 2 hours to get through the store because it was so hard to find things and it was so crowded. I left my cart at the end of the aisle to check on something and was back within a minute and my cart was gone! There was another cart there with a bunch of stuff in it and I figured someone would realize their mistake within a minute but after 10 minutes, no cart. I felt like I was in the twilight zone. Who would take my cart? And it took me 2 hours to find that crap… and I took the last one of most of the things in that cart. So I went out looking for my cart. After going through several aisles, I saw my cart with about three additional things in it. It looked abandoned and I’m pretty sure that when the person realized that it wasn’t their cart, they just decided that they were in no condition to be shopping and left. I pitched the extraneous things from cart and went on my way.
Thankfully Deb and Joe and Annette and Tracy came a little early to the party to help with the final prep work. Brian created a wonderful spread of food and the company was excellent. I found out my friend Ann used the same doctor I selected for my surgery. His nurse is one of her best friends. I spent a lot of time demonstrating the ROM Machine to various guests. Some tried it, even Jeanette who is 5 or 6 months pregnant and was wearing high heeled boots. Lisa passed off her Michael McDonald Christmas CD as a hostess gift. This was funny to me. I had a really good time at the party and didn’t stress too much about the fact that I couldn’t spend a lot of time with each guest.

The next day we spent time cleaning up the house. I had an appointment with an aesthetician that a friend recommended. As part of my post-baby makeover, I want to continue to improve my skin. I still struggle with blemishes and I would like to put that behind me. We were just going to do a consult but we ended up doing a facial and some microdermabrasion which I liked. She pretty much said my skin issues were systemic and to see a special doctor in Tucson for balancing out my hormones. I am interested but this doctor is in a private practice and doesn’t deal with insurance companies and likes to take 12 – 15 vials of blood for analysis (that is 1/3 of a pint). I am the woman who refused to take the 3 hour gestational diabetes test to avoid three blood draws in three hours. The thought of them drawing that much blood makes me woozy to even think about.

Not too much to report about the work week other than I exercised and did Pilates very faithfully, knowing that I will not be able to exercise for about a month after my surgery. On Friday Brian’s mom flew in for the weekend and his sister flew late at night to surprise his mom. We went out to dinner a couple times and Brian and I were able to have a date to the mall to get some nice shirts for Brian. Brian’s mom and sister don’t know about my surgery. I am afraid they will be judgmental about it. When they were here, Brian answered the phone with the speakerphone when my friend, Mary Beth, from Boston called and she said, Hi I'm calling to talk to Kelly before she has "her thing". I grabbed the phone and went to the bedroom but of course Brian's mom and sister asked if everything was OK. Brian said... oh yeah... it's just girl talk. Then he came into the bedroom and said, You have to figure out something to tell my mom and sister. I said, No I don't. You do... I didn't answer the phone on speaker in front of them! Fortunately they were very close to going to the airport so they didn't ask me anything. I can’t imagine trying to keep this a big secret from everyone. I don't have the energy to keep secrets like that.

So today is the big day. 2:30. I had my last meal at 6 AM. I know I will get more and more nervous as the day goes on but for now, I feel kind of numb.