Show a little bit Moore

I've always admired the shape of a pregnant belly. They're beautiful and quite literally bursting with life. Combine that with the supposed glow (which is still managing to elude me) and it makes for some very attractive women.

But now the shoe is on the other foot, or more appropriately the tum is on a different mum, and I'm not feeling particularly stunning... just plain old me. So when I was offered a free pregnancy photoshoot by a photographer friend, I was flattered but not thrilled with the idea. At this point I should mention that while some of the photos would be stock standard, others would be... *takes a deep breath*... NUDE!

I'll give you a minute while you get up off the floor... back on your chair now? Now where were we? Right, rudey nudey.

Plenty of women do nude maternity shoots. Demi Moore's photo on the cover of Vanity Fair magazine started it all off and the likes of Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears followed, as did a lot of “normal” women. Whilst considering the idea I was haunted by visions of English comedian Johnny Vegas when he parodied the famous Moore shoot. Let me tell you, that image is now burned in to my retinas forever, so it's only fair for me to share the joy.

The infamous Demi Moore photo on the cover of Vanity Fair

Slightly less infamous photo of Johnny Vegas

So far I've kept this blog pretty anonymous, and I don't think there is any risk in being “found out” by revealing that I don't actually look like Moore, Aguilera or Spears. I'm sure you guessed that anyway. And the people who do know me can vouch for this (although you all don't have to rush to comment saying what a minger I am, thanks). But there is one little thing that is keeping the idea in my head... photoshop. With liquify and blur my thighs and breasts will suddenly become taught and perky plus my tiny little crows feet with vanish! I will have smooth, flawless skin and I might even be made to GLOW!

Yet the notion that a strategically placed hand or the way a shadow falls could be all that distances me from “preggo porn” looms at the forefront of my brain. To be nude or not to be nude, THAT is the question, thanks, Hamlet.

Fight to the Death eBay Style

My sister P is a frugal queen and is always forthcoming with wise words of wisdom about saving money whilst not sacrificing quality or lifestyle, due to the fact she follows many a financial blog (yes, she's a bit of a geek, but that's why we love her). One of her frugal flashes was to set a goal for the amount of money spent on Tricky in the first year of his life. As soon as the budget of $1000 was mentioned I thought it was impossible... have you seen the prices of cots, change tables and car seats?? Even shopping at Baby on a Budget is expensive – I'm not sure who's budget they're catering for but it certainly isn't mine! So let's try the $1000 challenge!

I've always been a bit of an eBay junkie – I've bought lots of things ranging from makeup through to bathers and electronic toys. So why not use it for baby stuff? A lot of the items are big and pick up only, so while it cuts out over half the products for sale, it saves trying to figure out a courier cost from the eastern states.

There is a down side though. I'm pretty sure my blood pressure is sky rocketing at the end of each auction as I become the highest bidder for a few minutes until I'm knocked out of the race (probably by someone not participating in a budget challenge). I sit there with multiple windows open, a different high price in each, not trusting the automatic bidding system. Watching the countdown clock, calling out to Hubby “3 minutes, 26 seconds left!”, and if he answers back I don't actually listen – I can't listen – I'm way too busy being ruthless. This is the closest thing to armed combat I'll ever see. My weapons are strange prices, high speed broadband and the unpredictable craziness that comes with surging hormones – WATCH OUT!

Ok, so maybe not the healthiest option. A much more sedate version is Gumtree. List item, state the price you want, first person to make contact gets it. Easy. The only problem is people don't delete the ads after the item has sold, so you can be looking at an ad, only a few hours old, only to be told it sold immediately.

So far from Gumtree I've nabbed a Hug-A-Bub baby sling for $50 (RRP $120) and a cot for $150 (RRP ~$600). Plus with the cot the lady threw in a high-chair, a nappy holder and an older style swing bassinet, all in great condition. Because I'm fussy I'm going to sand back and paint the cot and bassinet, make them all pretty, ready for Tricky... who won't have a clue and really won't care that Mummy spent hours doing it.

Don't Phunk With My Heart

Wow the first 20 weeks have gone by so fast! We're half way already!

Anyone who has had a baby will know that between 18-20 weeks you have a 'foetal anatomy scan' which, as the name suggests, examines the baby's major structures to look for defects. They check out everything from the brain through to the arteries that supply the kidneys. They can also determine the sex at this scan... but that wasn't the thing occupying my mind.

I am the baby of the family and my sister Penny is the eldest... but for about 18 months in the early 1980's there was a middle child. Jo-Anne was our other sister and she was born with a hole in heart. I don't remember her, I was too little, but we have some lovely photos of the three of us to remind us she was with us for a short while. My family has a morbid sense of humour at the best of times, but when the topic turns to illness or death, it brings out the worst of the jokes, hence my mum always says that she had a rainbow family (way before Angelina Jolie made it cool) because Penny was normal, Jo-Anne was sick and I was jaundiced so she had a pink baby, a blue baby and a yellow baby!

So going for the scan this morning, the foremost thought in my head was concerning Tricky's heart, and if they would be able to detect any abnormalities. Knowing the family history, we were sent to a specialist antenatal sonographer and she spent about one third of the whole visit concentrating on the heart... and I'm happy to say it looks good! The technology today, a full 30 year's after Jo-Anne's birth, is so much more advanced that if Tricky does have a minor hole that was unable to be seen on the ultrasound (a very minor possibility), chances are good that it would be able to be fixed *Insert sigh of relief here*.

So with no phunking of the heart, there were other things that we wanted to know... like the sex of the baby! The sonographer asked us before she started if we wanted to know and we excitedly said that we did. She looked relieved and said “Phew, sometimes it's hard for me to hide the important parts” as if by some miracle Hubby and I could decipher the blobs on the screen. I can see head, legs, arms and a spine... that's about it. I'm still not convinced it's not an alien by the looks of it. So on goes the warmed up goo (ooh that's so much nicer than the stone cold stuff they sometimes use), the hand held part is placed on my tummy and within about three seconds... “It's a boy!”


The relief I felt is hard to describe. I wouldn't have minded either way, but I'd already started calling Tricky a 'he' and planning in my head for a boy. Even on my Christmas card from Hubby he wrote “from your (current) boys” because he was including our dog. What would I have done if it was a girl? The night before the thought of a baby girl had actually kept me awake for a while. I'm sure it would have only taken minutes to adjust... no, really I'm sure... well I guess I don't have to worry. Unless the sonographer got it wrong? Oh dear.

Cheers!

I was at a party once and getting up to get everyone drinks. I turned to a pregnant friend of a friend and asked “Can I get you a drink?” only to met with a rude glare and the response “I'm PREGNANT!”. I hadn't offered her a scotch on the rocks or a Bacardi Breezer, simply a drink, which as far as I am aware includes water, soft drinks and even, if you're lucky, fruit juice. That was my first impression of a pregnant woman and it turned me off the thought of having kids for a long time.

From mid December through to mid February I have at least one event on every weekend; engagement parties, hens nights, weddings, 21^st birthday parties – you name it, I've got it pencilled in. And so far, luckily, there has been no double bookings! I have chosen to not drink any alcohol during this pregnancy, much to Hubby's delight as he now has a live-in designated driver.

So what happens when you're accustomed to being a (big) social drinker and now can't partake in your favourite unwooded chardonnay? And what do other people think about me drinking or not? There seems to be three distinct groups – those that leave it up to the individual and don't pass judgement, those who think a little bit won't hurt and those who are very anti-alcohol (the latter being the most obvious because they have to pick up their jaws' from the ground as you stumble past with a pint).

Its Your Choice

At work on Friday afternoon drinks I was offered wine by three different people, all who knew I was pregnant. I was quite surprised, especially when one of them, on seeing me pick up the cheese based dip, smacked my hand and said “YOU CAN'T HAVE THAT, YOU'RE PREGNANT!”. In the dip there was a chance that there could be listeria, but I'm pretty sure the wine was guaranteed to have alcohol in it – my co-workers wouldn't stand for non-alcoholic wine at Friday drinks!

Just a Little Bit

At New Years I drank only soft drink and water, and got approving nods and smiles from friends whilst Hubby got congratulated on finding the secret to being able to drink and get a free lift home. However when I was offered a rum ball and politely refused due to the rum part, I was met with a look that said “Surely its not enough to do any damage?”. I'm sure they are right and the amount of alcohol in them would have been almost negligible, but I just felt better in myself to say no.

Jaw Droppers

At lunch with a friend of mine, E., (a pharmacist who knows practically everything worth knowing) we got on to this subject. She is a teetotaller and was very happy with my decision to not drink plus she assured me the half glass of wine I'd had before I found out I was pregnant wouldn't have done any harm. So anyway, E confessed to being a inadvertent jaw dropper! She told of how she had seen a pregnant woman at dinner recently with a glass of wine and how her first reaction was to think how irresponsible the woman was being (whilst picking up her jaw from her plate of spinach cannelloni). This of course immediately made her feel guilty for judging her not knowing any of the circumstances. Maybe it was the one and only glass she'd had all pregnancy? Maybe it was just one or two that night for a special occasion? We shall never know. But there is possibly some comfort for drinking pregnant women that the Jaw Droppers' do feel guilty for falling in to that category.

Even as a big social drinker, known for frothing at the mouth at the mere mention of a Goundrey's, I've not actually had any trouble abstaining from drinking. It doesn't feel like a burden or something that needs constant vigilance. And I haven't felt left out socially either. I think it was all in my head that I'd be 'the only one not drinking'. So now a decision has to be made; when Tricky is born will I resume drinking? You Betcha!

Baby Naming 101

Without knowing the sex of the baby, Hubby and I are compiling a very long list of possible baby names that changes on an hourly basis. I have visions of our child's crib at the hospital reading “BABY GLOW-LESS” because we still haven't come to a decision.

My problem is I really like the names in the 'top twenty'. The top boys name, Jack, is a lovely name but doesn't really go with our surname so I'll use it as an example. The likelihood of there being at least two or three other Jack's in his school class is high, so he would always be referred to as Jack F or (lets be honest, we're talking about children who are especially skilled at being mean) Smelly Jack or Lanky Jack. Will I burden my child with a Smelly Jack moniker?

As I grew up I was the only one with my name (Glow-less being quite unique), so whilst I didn't have to share it with anyone and be defined by my surname or a trait, I did have trouble with always having to spell my name to people (hyphens make it difficult). It was so hard to get anything with my name on it; sticker books, those little number plates for your bike – I wanted them so much! To this day I still look through the racks of items to see if I'm there, and get a little thrill and the urge to buy it if I find it - the Holy Grail of a personalised pen or toothbrush.

I'm not sure if today's kids are going to find it hard to get their pen's and toothbrushes personalised or not. Maybe the industry will grow with the increasingly weirder names that are coming out? Maybe poor Jack won't get anything with his name on it because all the J's will be Jordan, Jayden, Jackson, Jakson and Jaxson?

It seems today if you're name isn't weird, then you're destined to be a normal, boring person. Parents are naming their children after the rich and famous with the hopes their spawn will follow in it's namesake's Chinese Theatre footprints. And lets not forget the celebrities' poor children, currently assaulted by the “come up with the weirdest sounding name possible that will haunt your child until it's old enough to get it legally changed” trend. Some of my favourite (that is, the worst) of just this past year include:

Boys

Sophocles Iraia - Jermaine Clement & Mirandda Manasiadis

Bronx Mowgli - Pete Wentz & Ashlee Simpson

Atlas - James Tupper & Anne Heche

Sparrow James - Joel Madden & Nicole Richie

Girls

Petal Blossom Rainbow - Jamie & Jools Oliver

Mars Merkaba - Jay Electronica & Erykah Badu

Seraphina Rose - Ben Affleck & Jennifer Garner

Jagger Joseph Blue - Jason Goldberg & Soleil Moon Frye

Mind you, with some of those parents' names, I suppose naming your child something strange might be genetic.