29 Weeks

This week has been uneventful as far as pregnancy is concerned - which is great! The last report I got is that the babies are still doing great. Our next appointments are Aug. 6th with my local doc, and Aug. 7th with the specialist.
I have signed us up for a couple of classes a local hospital provides: Childbirth, Infant care & CPR, and breastfeeding. These are not through the hospital where I will deliver, as the only ones they have available are offered way too late. On the other hand, the classes I signed up for are not too late on the calendar, but very inconvenient, as in the evenings and weekend of our first week back with students. So, my questions to you are: Did you take any pre-baby classes? Do/did you find them necessary and helpful? Do you think it will be a tragedy if we are unable to attend?

Todd has been very busy doing projects again this week. Have you noticed all of the pictures of him smiling and working that I have posted lately? He has been great to "gladly" do projects to make our home more comfortable and ready for the babies. We have been wanting a deck or patio for years. It's always something that we put off for one reason or another (money, physical logistics of the yard, etc.) Well, we made a budget, saved the money, and blew the budget, but we now have a deck thanks to Todd's skill! I decided that I would really like to have a comfortable place to sit outside if I'm going to be home with the babies during the day. Also, we like to grill pretty often, so this gives us some more room to work with the grill and even eat outside. We got a table, chairs, umbrella, and fan, so we're set. It's nothing fancy and may seem kind of silly to get excited about, but it's a big deal to us. It still needs to be stained & sealed. We plan to plant something around it in the Spring, if we can.

Todd and I have also been working more on the babies' room and clearing out the guest room. This is hard to do when we have all our school stuff piled up just waiting for the day we can take it back to our classrooms.

Speaking of projects, here is a little one I did. This little silver platter had seen better days. Needed to be cleaned, but I don't have Tarnex and didn't want to go to the store. So, I googled how to clean silver and came up with this... Equal parts of salt & baking soda (they suggest 1 teaspoon, but I used a lot more) in boiling water with a container lined in foil. Let the item sit in the boiling water for a few minutes, remove and wipe with a soft cloth/towel, and tah dah! It works! I was so impressed!

And now I'll leave you with a true story...
We're in Sears looking at patio furniture. I sat down to write some notes; Todd went off to look at tools. So there I sit, writing, when I notice this hand slowly approaching my purse that sat in my lap. I automatically swatted it away like a bug, somewhat loudly said "NO!", and looked up to find this elderly lady with a crazed and determined look on her face. She reached again, as though she was trying to get in my purse. At this point I hollered out Todd's name twice. He immediately came to me and saw what was going on. By this time I was figuring out that there was something obviously wrong with the woman. She had been silent through this so far. Todd quickly approached then the lady said, slowly and kind of broken, "You are having a baby? That is why I touch your tummy." Oh my! So, I let her very briefly touch my tummy and Todd promptly said, "Okay, lets go!"
Todd later told me the whole occurrence was like the beginning of a horror film where some possessed old woman rubs the belly of a pregnant woman and the babies are born deformed and evil. Great!
I don't mind belly-touchers. It would be nice, though, if I know what you're reaching for first, so as to not scare me.