I want to start off by apologizing for taking over two weeks between posts. It’s completely irresponsible and no parent to be should be that absent minded about what they need to do. Except my wife who doesn’t care. Anyway that’s not important. The past few weeks I have had quite a bit going on with work and the house. I actually didn’t go onto the website for almost a week. So this Monday when I went on and saw that we were 29 weeks pregnant it caught me off guard. And I proceeded to get those butterfly feelings in belly (gut) as if I was nervous. And it turns out that I am a little nervous. The baby’s arrival is now less than 2 ½ months away. Think about that! That’s nothing! All my whining about how long it’s been taking and now it’s right around the corner and I’m border line nervous. I’m sure the nerves thing will pass as it gets closer. Right?

The past two weeks have produced few thoughts and none with much substance. Here they are, enjoy!

• Monday’s revelation that the baby will be here soon has caused me some anxiety about getting this baby named. Currently we are kicking around Grace Elizabeth, Sophia Marie, Madelyn Elizabeth, and Christina Marie. I also like the names Caroline Elizabeth and Pilar Elizabeth. If it was a boy I was ready to go to the mattresses for the name Maximus Knight Marseglia. So Kate better be happy it’s a girl. Hopefully at some point Kate will decide she’s not a control freak and she’ll just let me name our daughter.
• I really feel good about our chances of having everything done with the house well before the baby gets here. Right now we’re probably about a week or two away from having the kitchen complete. After that I’m probably looking at another week or two for the laundry room. This will leave over a month for the nursery. And the nursery really shouldn’t take more than two weeks. Yeah it might be cutting it close but who cares. It’ll definitely get done.
• I have been lucky enough to feel the baby move around inside Kate and it’s amazing. Kate said she is constantly moving around inside of her. Kate had an appointment on Wednesday and the doctor said she is a very active baby. When the doc was trying to listen to the heartbeat the baby would move and she would have to start all over again. The doctor said Kate’s tests are great and everything overall looks great. Kate weighed in at a robust 1_ _ lbs. Well within the healthy and normal range for someone as far along as she is.
  

I am extremely relieved that the end of our kitchen project is in sight. Kate should be calling today to set-up the appointment to have the flooring installed because the actually flooring has arrived. But this isn’t a blog about our house it’s a blog about the newest addition to our family. So here are some thoughts from the past week and a half.

• Kate is already complaining about being uncomfortable. This isn’t good considering she’s a mere 2/3 of the way through the pregnancy process. At the rate she is going she’ll be complaining 27 out of 24 hours a day in the final weeks.
• Hitting the third trimester has given me a renewed sense of eventual finality. Just a month ago it felt like it was taking forever and that the baby would never arrive. But now that we’re less than three months from the due date I’m starting to think that she’s going to be here in no time. It also gives me a better idea of how I can map out what else needs to get done before the arrival. Finish kitchen, finish laundry room, redo spare bedroom for nursery. Piece of cake!
• I’m starting to get past my own excitement and now starting to get excited for other people that we have this baby on the way. My older brother seems to be genuinely excited for the baby’s arrival. He always brings it up when we hang out. And Kate’s mom seems to want to start shaking she gets so excited when we talk baby. And I haven’t seen my mom this excited and happy since she “asked me” to move out when I was 19. Good times for all.
• Whenever I see small children, especially girls, I can’t help but try to picture what mine is going to look like. Is she going to be chubby with close facial features like Kate or utterly adorable like I was? Only time will tell.
• Kate still looks really good. As evidence by the most recent belly picture on the main page. But yesterday she called herself “a lard ass”. I’m really starting to think that Kate thinks everyone is supposed to look like Heidi Klum when she was pregnant. And since Kate doesn’t think she looks like a pregnant Heidi Klum she has convinced herself that she’s a physical mess. At some point I’m going to stop saying nice things because she doesn’t believe me anyway.
• Kate has few jobs to handle in regard to our kitchen project. Basically she needs to pick out colors and styles, set-up appointments for things to get done, etc. However she still manages to forget things. Mainly EVERYTHING! And she claims that it’s because she is pregnant. Yesterday, her sole purpose was to call and set-up the countertop guys to come out and build the template. I called her around noon and she said, “I forgot to bring the number to work”. She tried to push it off until today but I insisted she just call Lowe’s and request the number to the installer. Well, today rolls around and her job was to call the flooring guy who called us yesterday to set up a time to install the floor. I just got off the phone with her and what do you know! Absent minded prego girl forgot again. She’s becoming a liable. I fired her three times in the past week but she keeps showing back up at the house.

Here we are mere days away from entering the third trimester and I’m bored out of my mind. Not bored from a lack of things to do but bored in the sense of waiting for the baby to show her pretty little face. Don’t get me wrong I don’t actually want her to arrive now. I more wish Kate was getting to the end of the third trimester instead of the beginning. Tim, you’re a few weeks ahead of me, does it start to get any less boring anytime soon? Anyway here are some thoughts from the past week:

• This first one isn’t a thought as much as it is a comment about what Kate’s reaction is going to be from the post right below this one. Here’s what she’s going to say, “I don’t care what you want! If the first two babies are girls we’re still having at least one more!” This topic will be yet another stalemate in our attempt to make major decision (i.e. the baby’s name decision)
• I have officially started to refuse to wake Kate up when she falls asleep on the couch at night. I just go about my business getting ready for bed and climb under the sheets and fall asleep in peace. No more whining about not being comfortable or that I’m taking up too much of her side of the bed. It’s wonderful! Enjoy the couch Kate.
• With Kate being almost six months pregnant I have officially given up the dream of having one of our friends who live nearby have a kid who is the same age (i.e. same scholastic grade) as our baby girl. And to punish these no humping so called friends I will be leaving treats in your toilet tanks the next time I’m over you house. Note: the previous sentence may or may not have been inappropriate. I just don’t know.
• Kate and I are looking at a house Friday. It’s much bigger then our current house and it’s somewhere we could have 2-3 kids in. We also hope to look at another house that has six bedrooms and would allow us to have a whole volleyball team full of kids in. Of course this all depends on the second baby being a boy. Jay, the 6 bedroom house is a fixer upper on Scarlet Oak Rd. A mere nine iron from your parent’s house.
• As this final trimester begins I’m trying to be more of an adult. I’m trying to slowly change my ways. I need to look more like a real dad. In the past I would shave twice a week and that was it. Now I’m trying to shave every other day and I hope to be shaving everyday by the time my daughter gets here. I also am trying to be better at the cussing issue. That’s a work in progress. And most importantly I’m trying to get better at my manners. It’s been hard but I’m trying to eliminate the occasional nose picking, farting, and scratching of the private parts. I’m also trying to better incorporate thank you’s and please’s in my everyday vernacular. We’ll see how it goes as we get closer to the arrival.
  

In closing I just want to thank everyone (I just farted) for reading my posts and I hope (oh, that itches, ahh that’s better) you all have a great day.

I work a couple nights a week managing a pizza shop. Well, my boss’ wife gave birth Tuesday morning at 12:10am to their third child and their first boy. They have far better patience then I do because they waited until the birth to find out the sex. They were both really hoping for a boy. They even went as far as decorating the baby’s room for a boy. My boss was even on record as having said he was going to get REALLY drunk if it was another girl. His daughters are a handful and the thought of adding another girl to the mix was frightening. They both admitted it. They named him Antonio Sebastian Cottone. They are Italian Italians, not American Italians. Needless to say I am extremely happy for both of them. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone as relieved as my boss was yesterday. But the arrival of a boy after having two girls has me thinking of my situation.

Before we were even married I informed my wonderful wife that if our first two children were girls that we were stopping there. I even went as far as saying if and when we got to two girls, no matter what we hope to have (4-5), we were done. Well, in light of my boss’ success in passing his family name (he only has two sisters) I have decided to rethink those comments. So I did and I decided I'm absolutely sticking to them! Two and we’re done! I really want anywhere from 3-5 kids, finances permitting. But if the second one is a girl like the first then the buck stops there. It’s not that I’m going to love them any less or that I think they’re inferior to boys. It’s just that I’m looking at it over the short term AND the long term. What if we have three or four girls? I see that as not just having 3 or 4 little girls who adore there dad when they’re younger but I see 3 or 4 teenage girls who hate their dad because they’re moody and he won’t let them do what they want. I see picking up the tab for 3 or 4 weddings! I see a Friday night when up to four Marseglia girls are going out on dates with horny guys like I was! Horny guys who have hands with minds of their own. Typing this out is giving me a damn ulcer.

The bottom line is that for my long term health, and financial well being, I can’t have more then two girls. And if my two daughters read this some day, I love you both and I wouldn’t trade you two for anything in the whole wide world. And if my three or four daughters read this some day, your dad’s an idiot!