In continuation…how cute are these kids?

My baby sister-in-law Tamsin:

My niece Star:

Tamsin loves animals:

And Star makes me proud with her chopstick skills:

Star and Tamsin, both 2 years old now, were born 2 months apart. Now, Star’s mummy, Amy, is currently pregnant as well. Our due dates are, get this, 3 weeks apart (me first)!

Seems like the next generation of C.dine kids come in pairs.

I just read today that Jermaine Jackson’s son is called….are you ready for this? …..Jermajesty!

That’s just awesome.

Oh, the things I learn from Perez Hilton!

I went to the Malaysian Food Festival buffet at the UN Delegates Dining Room. The food was sub-par, but it was pretty cool having lunch at the United Nations, nonetheless. The view was spectacular. And for $25 ($32 plus everything), it’s a relatively good deal. However, despite what this site says, the desserts were appaling. The kuehs bore no resemblance to kuehs at all. So sad.

Right before lunch, I went to the toilet and threw up suddenly. There wasn’t any warning. Sure, my stomach didn’t feel very settled on the way to lunch, but I didn’t think I was feeling nauseous at all. But in my toilet stall, there it came. And it was a bad one. As in, I was uncontrollably LOUD. And the UN toilets are really old with low stalls, so I could literally hear my retching echoing through the entire bathroom. It was embarrassing. When I finally emerged, this lady who was applying her make-up looked at me, not with the look of pity I expected, but with a judging eye.

I wanted to tell her “I’m not bulimic! I swear! Just pregnant!”. And then I thought, what the hell. Who cares? And left to eat my buffet lunch heartily.

You know how I mentioned my lower belly feels like it has an orange beneath it? Well, I swear in the last couple of days, there Baby Chansidine went through a growth spurt. Suddenly, the orange feels like a mango, a big mango, not the petite Thai mango ones, but those big swollen Latin America ones. I feel really full all the time, even when I’m hungry, which is an odd feeling. My stomach (upper belly) can growl while my lower belly feels distended and bloated. I think I’m unconsciously tensing up my stomach muscles all the time (I catch myself) because I feel like if I relax, my lower belly will spill off to the side.

I literally roll off the bed now in the morning. I’m already feeling like a ball even before I actually start looking like one.

Is it just me or did Nancy Pelosi look like she was about to orgasm for 50 minutes during Obama’s address to the Congress last night?

Your pregnancy: 15 weeks

How your baby’s growing:
Your growing baby now measures about 4 inches long, crown to rump, and weighs in at about 2 1/2 ounces (about the size of an apple). She’s busy moving amniotic fluid through her nose and upper respiratory tract, which helps the primitive air sacs in her lungs begin to develop. Her legs are growing longer than her arms now, and she can move all of her joints and limbs. Although her eyelids are still fused shut, she can sense light. If you shine a flashlight at your tummy, for instance, she’s likely to move away from the beam. There’s not much for your baby to taste at this point, but she is forming taste buds. Finally, if you have an ultrasound this week, you may be able to find out whether your baby’s a boy or a girl! (Don’t be too disappointed if it remains a mystery, though. Nailing down your baby’s sex depends on the clarity of the picture and on your baby’s position. He or she may be modestly curled up or turned in such a way as to “hide the goods.”)

How your life’s changing:
You’ve probably gained about 5 pounds by now (a little more or less is fine, too) and are well into the swing of your pregnancy…Don’t be surprised if you and your partner are feeling a little stressed out these days. Many pregnant couples worry about their baby’s health and how they’ll handle the changes ahead. But with physical discomforts on the wane and energy on the rise, this is also a wonderful trimester for most women.

Dude…my baby has EYELIDS! EYELIDS!!!! Totally rad!

15 weeks! Woo! According to friends, I do not yet look pregnant. Those who have seen my belly tell me I just look like I ate a big meal. Which is true. I have gained a couple of pounds (it goes up and down) I think since about 3 weeks ago. I’m not worried; plenty of moms, especially first-timers, do not pop for a few more weeks. And to be honest, I am not in a hurry to get HUGE.

My favorite part of the day has been the morning. That’s when my belly is at its flattest, i.e. not bloated from food or gas (which is now a common occurance), so I can feel my uterus (I think). It now feels like I have an orange right above my pubic area. I like to lay down there and rub the orange and think happy thoughts.

I haven’t felt any movements yet. There have been times where I felt a mini-movement but I swear it’s just gas.

I don’t know anything about the stresses BabyCenter is speaking of. I have always been pretty at peace at each stage of my adult life and this doesn’t feel any different.

I had a fantastic weekend. And I can’t remember the last time I had such a fantastic weekend. And by fantastic, I mean that I (a) did not feel nauseous nor tired; and (b) I had nothing to do. I had a delicious do-nothing day (well I worked from home during the day, but I never really feel like it’s work when I’m doing it at home cos I actually do enjoy what I do) on Saturday. And Sunday, I had a great girlfriend day that started off with a brunch and ended off with a ladies’ “Sunday Salon” at Liz’s. I finally felt my life was back “to normal” because I felt normal again and I was actually socializing. I guess this is the lull before the storm, before my life will never be back “to normal”, as in a pre-kid normal, forever….F-O-R-E-V-E-R…..(cue horror music).

I had been so busy the last couple of weekends with the sudden move. Now, the move has been completed, the old apartment cleaned. I finally feel like I don’t have any “projects” at hand, aside from regular work of course, and it really feels fantastic. I have realized that with the CFA studying, and everything else (moving, etc etc etc), I had constantly had a “project” to complete in the last 3 years.

Granted, this gestating thing is by far the biggest project I have embarked, but finally I feel like I can sit back and enjoy the ride, without throwing up. I was really into reading baby books and all that in the first few weeks of getting pregnant. And I feared that, as with everything else in my life, that I’d get sucked into over-studying for this. And there is SO much to read out there. About vaccinations. About labor. About baby names. About how to nurse. About this and that and this and that. And to be honest, right now, I’m just feeling too damn lazy for once in my life. All the books that have been given to me are still packed away and sealed in boxes during the move and I have no desire to open them right now. I’m sure there is plenty to learn and I’ll learn them in due time. For now, Baby Chansidine knows what to do.

P.S. We don’t know yet whether Baby Chansidine is a boy or girl. We’ll know for sure at the end of March at the anatomy scan at 20 weeks. I have a 16-week prenatal checkup next week with my doctor and I wonder if we’ll know by then. Exciting!

I’ve been forgetting momentarily that I’m pregnant these days. That is a good thing. In the first trimester, I was incessantly reminded by the constant nausea that KELLY YOU ARE PREGNANT YES YOU ARE NOW GO PUKE! I’ve been feeling so much better these days that at times, I feel like the regular non-pregnant me again and I’ll go, oh wait, yes, I’m supposed to be pregnant. My best friend asked me how it felt like to be pregnant, if I felt a glow, an aura. To be honest, nothing feels different. The only thing that felt different was that I felt so ill. Now that it has pretty much passed, everything feels the same, only I now have slightly bigger boobs and a bloated stomach, which is not noticeable in a new bra and stretchy pants. The only times I felt that all-empowering aura of pregnancy was when I saw the baby in the sonogram and then it felt so real, vs. an almost theoretical concept that I am gestating. I’m sure it’d be different once I get so big it’s hard to ignore, or when I feel Baby Chansidine kick me in the ribs.

Of course then, I had a dream last night related to forgetting that I am pregnant. I dreamt that I already had a baby, but I’d go about my life and constantly forget I had a baby. And one day, in the dream, I suddenly started and went “OMG! I have a baby! Where’s the baby?!” and I found the baby laying somewhere bundled up on the floor looking at me with hungry eyes (because it hasn’t been fed the whole day, you see, cos I forgot about it) and then I put the baby to my nipples to feed and of course it hurt like a mofo. In the dream.

Can you tell I’m going to be an awesome mom?

3 of 4 Chansipussies have been moved. The first to go was Graciela, who was placed in our cart as such:

and Pat just pushed him down the street to our new place 2 blocks away. There wasn’t even a peep from him. At the new apartment, he just laid down and napped, like he always does, all day. He who has lived in Florida, Colorado, San Francisco, Singapore and New York is a stellar mover!

Buddy and Zion on the other hand were freaked out. They meowed meowed meowed in the cage, and continued to meow frantically at nothing in the apartment for the first day. My first night there was brutal because both of them, mostly Buddy, meowed ALL FREAKING NIGHT. Thankfully, this has subsided. Zion’s pretty much at home by the 2nd day. Buddy still meows at random times, but he is now promptly greeted with a face full of water when he does.

They took to the new apartment better than I thought. At our old place, they had free reign of the backyard, and into other people’s backyards. While I liked that they could play outside, I wasn’t a big fan of them being indoor-outdoor kitties. In part because of the terrible flea problem they brought home last summer. And also because it’s just gross. I have no clue where their paws have been when they walk back home. I’d rather keep them in the house as they will now. We have a terrace in the new apartment, but they are so not getting out there. And strangely enough, Buddy and Zion have been behaving wonderfully. They were alright with each other in Singapore. But once they had exposure to the outside world at the old apartment, Buddy turned really aggressive (I blame possible exposure to stray cats outside) and both of them would hiss and fight all the friggin time. At the new place, so far anyway, they have been less agro and I even caught Buddy licking Zion’s face this morning with no repurcussions! AND, they have used the cat litter box (which they haven’t used in a while since they went in the backyard) with no accidents, so far, fingers crossed. They are so awesome!

Poor Slope. She’s always been the super scaredy cat. She’s still outside in the backyard at the old place and refuses to come back in. I don’t blame her. She’s seen Graciela being taken away. Then Zion and Buddy, both meowing frantically in their cages. And then they….disappeared…and never returned again. I wouldn’t trust us if I were her.

Let’s just hope she gets hungry enough to get home. We have till the end of the month before we have to vacate the old apartment.

Your pregnancy: 14 weeks

This week’s big developments: Your baby can now squint, frown, grimace, pee, and possibly suck his thumb! Thanks to brain impulses, his facial muscles are getting a workout as his tiny features form one expression after another. His kidneys are producing urine, which he releases into the amniotic fluid around him — a process he’ll keep up until birth. He can grasp, too, and if you’re having an ultrasound now, you may even catch him sucking his thumb.
In other news: Your baby’s stretching out. From head to bottom, he measures 3 1/2 inches — about the size of a lemon — and he weighs 1 1/2 ounces.
…Welcome to your second trimester! Your energy is likely returning, your breasts may be feeling less tender, and your queasiness may have completely abated by now. If not, hang on — chances are good it will soon be behind you (although an unlucky few will still feel nauseated months from now).

Holy cow! The baby actually looks like a baby now! That’s just nuts to think that Baby Chansidine is looking like a baby!

The nausea has definitely abated somewhat. I actually had 1 full day on Sunday of not feeling nauseous one single bit! It was the first day in a while I felt remotely normal. It could be because we were moving all day, so I was distracted, but I like to think that this is the start of brighter days to come. I had a weird tummy again last night, but again, much improvement.

The appetite has been much improved as well. Recent cravings have extended beyond Singaporean food to Italian food (pizzas and pasta). Which makes sense, cos Baby Chansidine will be half Singaporean, 1/8 Italian and 3/8 Irish, with a dash of American Indian. Although I can’t for the life of me imagine myself craving for Irish or American Indian food. Potatoes and buffolo maybe? You really never know!

The move is substantially completed, and now the only things left to do is to clean up the old pad, unpack and clean up the new place. I’m feeling so at peace in the new place and know for sure this was the right decision. The old place would have worked with a baby, but it’d have required working out. I was just plain exhausted last night with the move. I crawled into bed and I realized that I could see the Empire State building while laying in bed. That is pretty bad ass, I thought.

Even though I hate moving, I love moving. It’s such a pain to pack and move, but there’s something awesome about moving to a new place. A new start! A new room! A new view! I love it! Maybe that’s part of the reason why I have a fear of committing to a mortgage.

The last time I moved within a driving distance, and not across oceans (which to me, is an entirely different experience. Moving across oceans is almost easier cos you just pack your clothes and your cats, and that’s it really. You pretty much buy everything else again), was when I moved into Pat’s apartment from Berkeley to San Francisco. It was torture because I kinda just fork-lifted everything randomly into big garbage bags and I had no clue what I was doing.

This time, since I’m a proper late-20s adult and all, I have become alot more organized, packing things into boxes according to function and *gasp* labeling them. I can no longer stand having things in random places (clutter!!!) like how I used to. I like to have things neat in their proper places. Is this the “nesting instinct” they speak of?