Inevitably Keely

1. I'm still pregnant. Remember when I said I thought Finn was going to come early? Well, I've changed my mind. I think he's so darn comfy in there it's a good thing we've scheduled the doc to get him out because I think he'd live in there forever if he could. 2. My toes are pretty, pedicured and blue! The last time I got a pedicure was at the very beginning of this pregnancy 10 years 9 months ago, so I did not feel at all guilty for shelling out a little bit more for a "SPA pedicure". I'm partial to a pedicure where I get to sit in one of those fancy chairs and not have the entire salon talk about me to each other in their language or try to convince me that I really "need" my eyebrow done/legs waxed. Anyway, it was heaven except for the conversation: "So, when is your baby due?" "I'm having a c-section on New Years Eve." 15 minutes later.... "So, what are you doing New Years Eve?" "I'm having ...

Rules: Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 16 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 16 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you. I did this because I was tagged by some friends on Facebook and decided I might as well post it here too. I'm not tagging anyone here, but if you want to share I would love to read your answers. Here's mine: 1. I have a blog , as well as Twitter , Flickr , Facebook, and Myspace accounts so I sort of feel like coming up with 16 things seems silly because I feel like I've shared so much already. 2. I'm such a sap that sometimes I hide behind my sarcasm/humor/complaining to cover up how nervous, worried or scared I am. I worry that this coping mechanism sometimes makes me sound like I don't love being a mother or that I'm not enjoying my pregnancy. I do and I am - honestly. 3. Becoming a mom ...

Between not feeling like myself physically with this damn cold/flu/whatever and not feeling like I have anything more important to say than what I said yesterday ... I'm going to just ask that you read the 2 posts below this one. I find myself complaining about my discomfort or stress sometimes and that all seems to pale in comparison to losing ones home in a fire. Clearly there are people out there worse off than me and I feel like I have so much to be thankful for. Mmm. Future blog post that I'm NOT going to wait until Thanksgiving to post. Stay tuned.

I've noticed it's harder for me to blog on Saturday's and Sunday's. Those are the days where I have Daniel with me and where I don't feel like I'm missing out on adult interaction. I feel less of a need to connect when I've got my favorite conversationalist here with me. Today I felt this even more because after a friend helped Daniel move Zoe's brand new and very heavy dresser into her room, we sat in our living room catching up with him and one of my favorite people - his fiance. We talked about weddings, theatre, Prop 8, politics, the environment, etc. and I felt happy to have them in our lives and friends who we can just sit back with and relax. I couldn't help but observe I am making lots of headway in my needing to have my house perfect when guests are over because I didn't even blink at the messy kitchen or the carpet that needs vacuuming. I mean, I'm freaking out a little about those things now, but for a time they were less important...

This has been a week! I am so tired and lazy feeling! Lucky for me, today is Daniel's Friday off so I've had time to actually take a shower and I'll get to relax more today. Him having every other Friday off is the most wonderful thing, truly. At this moment, he's playing his PS3, Zoe is in her Jumperoo, Max is barking at the horses on the TV and Bailey is pacing and freaking out at the gardeners in the back and front yard. Yeah. It's exciting here, folks. I'm flipping through a new cookbook (I love the photos. If there are no photos in a cookbook, I won't even look at it.) and considering making something out of it or breaking in the brand new Crockpot. What sounds good to me though, is not cooking a single thing and just relaxing. We'll see what happens. I tend to have a hard time doing nothing and I do have some Christmas decorations to finally put away. My dad gave me a hard time about it yesterday and suggested I just leave them up until next Chris...

I am entertaining the idea of committing to Blog 365 . Entertaining. The concept interests me and I'm thinking I enjoyed NaBloPoMo so much, why the heck not? But I dunno. It's just a thought. I'm still not feeling up to par. Daniel is feeling much better. Yesterday was horrible - his mom and my parents got the stomach flu and they were all feeling miserable. Daniel and I left his dad with the baby (at his urging) to go see the new National Treasure movie. It was so-so, but we enjoyed it. My parents left with their parrot (an African Grey) and their dog, Buffy today. We spent today giving Daniel's parents an exciting tour of Bakersfield and now we're resting back at the house. If all goes well, we're making a day trip over to Ojai just to get some fresh air and get the heck out of here. Our good friends got married in Ojai and Daniel and I fell in love with the small community when we were there the weekend of the wedding. I think it will look like paradise to Da...

We were going to relax today. Instead, we bought new tires, Christmas shopped (but bought nothing*), had lunch, exchanged a highchair for the one we ordered, got Daniel a haircut, ordered & ate pizza, gave the kiddo a bath, splished, splashed, played. Currently, we're watching Live Free, Die Hard and trying to mellow out while I feed Zoe before she's put to bed. Tomorrow is another day and I'm hoping it will be restful. But there are things to be done.... * - OK, we did find a new hat for the monkey. It's a panda hat, and it's adorable:

Tonight was our fifth rehearsal for Imaginary Friends. We have sixteen more before we open. OMG! Sixteen, that's it. There are parts of me that are enjoying this process immensely. Getting to work with these talented people in a theatre that I have wanted to work in since I first saw a show there almost five years ago is very cool. Having to do research on the amazing Mary McCarthy and trying to understand how she worked and why she had this feud with Lillian Hellman has been very enriching and interesting. Both women were forces to be reckoned in the literary community. I admire them both, but would have liked Mary more, I think: possibly because she is who I am playing. This play is pushing me in different ways than shows I've done in the past. No, I do not have to do the Cha Cha while dealing with my first trimester of pregnancy and the singing shouldn't be too difficult (no harder than any of the opera's I've been in, I'm sure). I will have to smoke on stage...

4:30 am - Get stirred from sleep when husband gets up to get ready for work. Fall back asleep, but not before saying a little prayer that husband doesn't wake Zoe with the noise of getting ready so darn freaking early. 6-ish - Say "goodbye, have a nice day, I love you, be careful, goodbye, I love you." spiel while half asleep. 7-ish - Hear Zoe waking up. Get her, dress her, feed her, relax with her in bed, sing to her and plead with her to please take her morning nap early so I can get some more rest. This process takes about a little over an hour. 8:30-10:30 - Have the most peaceful nap I've had in ages with Zoe curled up next to me and a large chunk of my hair in her little hand - she fell asleep petting me. I wake up first and watch her sleep for a few minutes longer. She looks just like her Daddy when she sleeps. 10:30-10:40 - Pry hair from baby's grasp and go take a quick shower while Zoe still sleeps on bed with a wall of pillows surrounding her. I shower ...

With my friend here, I didn't get a chance to take the pictures I promised. I did pick up Daniel's and my Christmas present to each other early: a larger television. We'd been using a 23 inch that I purchased pre-Daniel and decided it was time to upgrade to a 40 inch LCD. I'm not sure if the larger living room was to blame (the couch sits back further) or just my eyesight faltering with age and the birth of a child, but with the old t.v. I was squinting to make out subtitles and people. It was ridiculous and frustrating. And now? It's glorious. I mean, it's just a television but I grew up with a small screen and this is like having our own mini theater. And Daniel? He's pretty excited to experience the Wii and PS3 with this new purchase. We also picked up a highchair for Zoe today. I'm looking forward to us feeding her many meals in it and it will be nice to have her sitting up at the table for us - especially when both sets of her grandparents are here ...

The house is looking pretty darn fabulous with the help of Daniel. We ran around cleaning and straightening like sick fools. Nothing is hanging on the walls yet, but when we were done I was grateful to my husband for all his help and excited for my parents to arrive. So yeah. That's pretty much all you're going to get from me today. If it weren't for NaBloPoMo, I would not be posting at all. But I've got a funny story to share with you tomorrow. Oh, and some new possibilities just around the corner*. Care to guess? *I'm thinking I'll reveal my little secret on Wednesday if all goes according to plan.....

So, Daniel is going to be home with the Monkey pretty soon, so I figured I'll get some quick blogging in - nothing fabulous, just a few things on my mind. Today is 'Mama Monday'. I'm sick, so 'Mama Monday'? Not so much with the fun and the socializing and stuff. I was feeling too horrible this morning to get up out of bed and wake Zo-Zo. Yeah, that's right I wake her. She sleeps through the night (and has for a while) from about 9:30pm to about NINE or TEN in the morning. I kid you not. I would not kid about such important things as sleep. I also would not brag, because you just watch.... tonight she will demand to stay up all night and then wake up at 6am. So me? NOT bragging. Just letting you know that I am feeling pretty darn lets just say DAMN! lucky right about now, even if I do feel like crap. Daniel did me the favor of coming to get Zoe during his lunch and taking her to Cheryl's for the afternoon. I relaxed. I napped. I watched streaming video o...

When Daniel and I first met sleep was less important. We were doing shows and then going out afterwards with the casts. Daniel would need to be at work early in the morning, but it didn’t stop us from staying up late at night – talking, reading, surfing the internet, watching movies, etc. We were young then. With the arrival of Zoe, we value sleep more now than ever before. The little one takes a lot of energy out of us. So much so that it is a great accomplishment to be in bed at 9:30 pm and have our daughter sound asleep. I find myself crossing my fingers that she'll sleep three hours straight. Sunday night we got to sleep from 9:30 to 3:30 and I was overjoyed. Six hours of uninterrupted sleep! It was amazing! So amazing that we made it a point to be in bed at 9:30 last night too. Fast forward. I hear a faint knocking. The dogs are barking a little. I nudge Daniel and tell him I hear knocking. He’s so sleepy he’s practically sleep talking – but he tells me it’s the bed. I wonder ...

My mom loves American Idol. So much so, that when she and my dad came to visit Daniel and I in the hospital on day 2 of my induction, she searched and searched on our television for the channel with her beloved show on it. There I was having contractions (and trying to smile through it) as my mom clicked the remote over and over again. The hospital TV remote was lame and didn’t allow you to input numbers, so those arrows just kept getting pushed. At one point she said, “I just want to hear the song!” And by “the song”, I’m pretty sure she meant the opening music or theme music… and that’s what I call obsession, people. I, on the other hand, could care less about that show or any reality TV for that matter. I’ve never jumped on that bandwagon. All of those shows annoy the heck out of me and I cannot understand people’s fascination with the genre. I’ve seen tidbits and I’m unimpressed. And no, Mom… I do not want to be a contestant on the show – EVER! All that said, I discovered The Next ...

I've been going back and forth on what to do with my hair as of late. Well, actually... I've been going back and forth on that since my second trimester with Zoe. Before I got pregnant with the little one, I went to "my lady" every six weeks. I've been seeing Brigette for five years; Daniel's been seeing her for four years... we invited her to our wedding for goodness sakes. Who does that? With Brigette I get color, a trim, and some laughs. I always ask her to make my hair really, really dark and she always makes it just a little less dark than I had wanted because she's worried too dark would be too severe. She might be right. She's made me more blonde, blonde with black underneath, dark, dark with bright red streaks and then dark again. She's cut my hair shoulder length and given me bangs for the first time since I was 13. I go to her and am always confident that I'll look good when I leave her chair two and a half hours later. I trust Briget...

Wanted to do a quick post to let y'all know I'm takng a hiatus from blogging for a bit. Between just not being that into blogging right now, the upcoming arrival of Zoe, and recent events - this just isn't on my list of priorities. I'm not sure how long it will last. Maybe a week or so... maybe longer. Who knows? What I will say is that everything is going great with my pregnancy. Daniel and I are happy and excited and eagerly awaiting the end of May and our little girl. We replaced the red sectional with a lovely leather sofa & loveseat. The dogs don't seem to have the inclination to want to dig or eat it away to nothing and it looks nice. I know I promised photos, eventually I'll post something. Thanks for checking in on me and my blog. Thanks for all your kind words. I'll be back. Eventually.

So far, this is shaping up to be a busy/fun week. Someone is going to get a haircut. Something is going to get hauled away. Some photos are going to be taken. Something is going to be built. Somethings are going to be delivered. Someone is going to be seen 3D/4D. Someone is coming to visit. Some stuff might get hung. And me, I'm supposed to be taking it easy. Luckily, most things require me to just sit back and enjoy/direct. Still... I'm going to need to rest A LOT so that I can enjoy all this weeks happenings. Pictures to follow, surely.

So. The glider is built. It's comfy. Max eyes it whenever he gets the chance. Jumps on our laps and sways against the glider, but appears to love it. Bailey could care less. She seems bothered by our time spent in the smallish room with all the black furniture, but does enjoy sitting under the crib. Max joins her and then they wrestle.... under the crib. Must stop that soon before it gets out of hand. The changing table arrived Monday night, but we (well, Daniel) waited to build it until last night because he was feeling sick. One of us, or both of us is constantly feeling bad since New Year's day. It sucks. It makes me lazy and cranky. I have too much to do to be lazy and I don't like being cranky. Except I'm not so sure my crankiness is obvious. Sometimes I feel the need to just make the announcement. "Hey. I'm cranky." That usually makes me feel a little bit better. We got the call Monday night that the bedding we'd ordered arrived in San Diego. I p...

Someday soon, I will write about my hopes for 2007. I will not post resolutions because I don't really do those, but I will probably post some goals. I'll probably do some reflecting. I might even choose some of my favorite photos from 2006, because that just sounds like fun. Eventually, (maybe even in the next few days) I will write about some of my favorite moments of 2006. Some of them were extraordinary and lush & some were sweet and simple. At some point, I'll even get around to posting those photos of me back when I was a blondie, maybe before my roots grow out. But for now, I'm not going to do any of that. Daniel and I managed to be well for the first time in three years for New Years Eve/his birthday, only to wake up sick the next day. We're still recovering. What I will leave you with is one of my happiest days I've ever had. September 19, 2006. These are self-portraits I took with my cell phone camera the day we found out we were going to be parent...

Greetings from San Diego! Daniel and I got to my parents house last Friday and have been having a nice time away from home. Regardless of the friends we've made in Bakersfield, it's always nice to escape to a new environment for a while. My parents left on Christmas Eve for their timeshare on Coronado, so we've had their house to ourselves for the past few days. Well, not really. We're sharing their house with their dog, Buffy, their African Grey, Palucci and our own dog children. So far we've just been relaxing. We went and saw Night at the Museum during the afternoon on Christmas Eve and had a nice dinner out. We've spent a lot of time in a local coffee house writing and relaxing. We cooked at home last night and plan on doing so for the next couple nights as well. In between all our relaxing we've gone baby shopping with some of our Christmas money. We've decided on a crib and changing table in black. I've decided I don't need an ottoman to go...