Aimee's Like-Dislike Recap

Do you ever wish you could dislike a friend's Facebook status? I do all the time. Whether it is some ridiculous political diatribe on either side of the spectrum or them stating they have terrible diarrhea, I find myself wishing I had a dislike link I could click. Why don't they have that button? Sometimes I wish for a TMI button too but that is just wishful social networking thinking on my part. I digress...

In an effort to catch up with you all I am going to give you my recent likes and dislikes ala Facebook status style. Here we go.

• Aimee can see the water from her apartment and can walk to the lovely downtown Madison Park within minutes.

We are finally feeling settled in our new place. It is funny how it takes time for a new home to feel like home. I get all melancholy when I leave a place I have resided in for a time (there is usually misty eyes on that final drive away) and I have to have a bit of time to warm up to my new abode. Then one day without even realizing it you drive up and walk in and it feels and smells like home. It slowly but inevitably becomes your home, and your home becomes your sacred place. We all need our sacred place. Sometimes it just takes a little while to settle into that space. We are almost there.

Here is a picture of the first night we stayed here after a somewhat epic move:

I had packed up the bedding and left the box upstairs thinking Scott would come up and get it. In the moving craziness we didn't communicate and the box was left upstairs and we ended up sleeping with towels as pillows and our robes as blankets because that is all we had. It was strangely romantic in that we-don't-have-much-but-we-have-each-other kind of way. We've come a long way since that night. We even have pictures hung. Big accomplishment in the unpacking to-do's.

• Aimee gets to drive through the arboretum every single day.

If you don't know Seattle and don't know what the arboretum is let me just tell you it is a beautiful and lush botanical oasis. It is the kind of place you drive through and you feel happy to be alive and it makes you believe in God. I get to feel this way everyday. Lucky me. You should come visit me and drive through yourself. It might make a believer out of you.

• Aimee has no dishwasher or disposal. 

This statement really needs no commentary except ugh.

• Aimee wants to thank the car insurance Gods for taking good care of them.

A couple week ago the insurance told us we were going to get far less for Scott's car than we supposed because it was a salvaged title. We got a call today with good news and are getting a bit more than we supposed. Lucky us. Still haven't found a new car up to our liking and price range. (I would dislike this last statement if there was a button for it.)

• Aimee is streaky and orange.

Being a little tired of the lack of sunshine here in Seattle, I thought it a good idea to darken up my pasty glory and use some tanning lotion. Since being married to Scott, tanning is something I've had to give up compromise on. I guess he doesn't want me to get cancer?! Needless to say, I am an amateur at applying the sun tanning lotion and hope that 1) I get better at application or b) the sun looks at a calendar and realizes it is actually summer now.

• Aimee is officially in the third trimester. 

We start our birthing class tomorrow night. As time goes on I start to realize that this little person kicking me has to actually exit my body. I anticipate and completely fear this experience. I am hoping the birthing class settles the fear so that I can openly embrace the whole labor experience.

• Aimee's biggest complaint about pregnancy is her chronic stuffy nose. 

 I've had a fairly easy pregnancy but if I were to complain about anything it would be this dang stuffy nose or Rhinitis of Pregnancy that came on strong in the first trimester, eased up in the second, and is in full force once again. Achoo. Sniff. Sniff. Bleck. Scott forced me to try the neti pot tonight. Strange sensation.

• Aimee is about to get sentimental. Read on at your own risk.

The other day Scott was saying the prayer over our chicken and rice and he was saying funny things about being thankful for the baby and how even though we say it, we know the baby isn't actually going to ruin our life etc. etc.... so I laughingly opened my eyes to get a look at him and realized that we have created a life together. He and I, together, made a human - part Aimee, part Scotty - which in turn, bonds and seals us in a way far beyond what we have experienced in our time together as a married couple. Even if we end up getting divorced (which we won't) or if someone dies (which they won't) we have this person that connects us on a spiritual level deeper than I realized. It is funny how marriage is a little like settling into a home. At first, your spouse still feels like your boyfriend. And then slowly, over the years, this person actually becomes your family. It doesn't happen overnight with the reading of vows. It is a slow melding and then one day you see that person and your love for them is equal to the love you feel for the family you were raised in and then takes a whole different shape as the years pass and you sleep with towels as pillows, hang pictures, feel squished in your queen bed after sleeping in a king for 6 months, fight in Ikea over a $290 kitchen island... and eventually make little people together.

Time; what a master artist you are.

• • •

That is all for now, my friends. It is time for bed. I hope you all are doing well. I miss you all dearly and will continue to do my best to check in regularly. Don't be a stranger either.

*I would also like to say that I believe that even couples who can't create their own version of little humans have this same melding and connection with adoption or foster or however else they decide to define family. It just needed to be said.