Some pregnancy symptoms are here--- I am so exhausted and I do... NOTHING. I am so disappointed in myself lately. I think I need to get a kick in the arse... Or something like that. A jumpstart. I know that pregnancy is exhausting, but there are things that need to be done! And much as Luke is a treasure, he's not very good at cleaning yet! It is hard to get out of bed in the morning, and I crash out at about 2 in the afternoon. It's all I can do to get Luke in his "rest time" (he hasn't taken an actual nap for about a year now). Then I crash out for an hour, until the after school games begin!

So, I have exhaustion, which I did experience with my miscarriages, too. But I also have some nausea, enough to make me not want to eat certain foods, and to all of a sudden dislike sweetened drinks (like Fruit2O). I am also satisfied with one cup of java. And sometimes that's too much. But I don't have full-blown nausea. I am cautiously optimistic, because with my healthy pregnancies I did have full blown morning/afternoon/evening sickness starting anywhere from 6 weeks to about 8 weeks, so... I'm not nauseated enough to give me a comfort level of complete familiarity, but I'm not "normal" feeling enough to make me overly worried... I just want to skip the first trimester... That's all. It's so hard.

So far Mac hasn't taken on any of my symptoms! I am not joking. He usually takes on my pregnancy symptoms. With the twins, he developed food aversions, cravings, and of course, weight gain. He, in fact, gained 70 lbs! It was quite the let down when I had the babies, and suddenly my weight dropped by about... 40 lbs, and he stayed the same. That's why I'm thankful he's in the ARMY. He has to stay reasonable fit, enough to pass the physical training tests every six months. No cravings for him!!! He's so funny.

My parents are coming to visit this weekend. I need to get the house in some type of order for them. If it were just my mom, it wouldn't matter. But my dad is not used to the chaos! They have a cleaning lady who comes every 2 weeks- and it's just the two of them, so their house never gets very messy. And my mom is a compulsive cleaner. So... Well, welcome to my life, mom and dad. Feel free to compulsively clean to both of your hearts' content!!! The kids are excited, so that's nice. It's great that they get to see their grandparents so much. I am very lucky. I am not going to tell my parents about the pregnancy though. I am going to call my grandma first and tell her. I am still going to wait until we feel "safe" though, since I just don't want it getting back to the kids should I miscarry. Especially since Steven is uber-fascinated with death, since going to my great-grandpa's burial service last November.

Kate has been a little darling lately.............. NOT! (Wasn't that about the most obnoxious trend of the 80s? The whole, "You're cool..... NOT!" thing...) So, she is actually grounded for 6 whole weeks. Busted big time for going on line in her room when she was already grounded for being sassy and disrespectful. So, she broke the terms of her grounding by going on line, late at night, AND she broke the terms of the house by going on line in her room, for which we had set a strict 1 month grounding policy, plus no more use of laptop. Period. But what really made me crazy was that she lied, in my face, about the entire thing.

Me: Where is the antennae for the internet? (We have a really old laptop- no built in connectivity)
Kate: Isn't it upstairs by the computer?
Me: No.
Kate: That's where I saw it... Do you want to have the DVDs? I can give them to you now. I'm not done watching them, but that's OK.
Me: Alarm bells.... She is offering me something she likes, even though I didn't ask about it... OK-- give me the DVDs. You can't watch DVDs in your room anymore.
Kate: Here you are, in a very sweet voice.
Me: Are you going on line here in your room?
Kate: No way, looking scandalized that I would suspect such a thing.

Me: Upstairs with Mac: Did you see the wireless thingy yet?
Mac: No.
Me: It's in her room, then. She lied.

Mac downstairs: Kate open the door now, or you will have no more door.
Kate: What?
Mac inside the room, looking at the internet thingy on the floor of her room (I mean, she didn't even hide it??? What was she doing all this time!?): Kate, you're in big trouble. Go upstairs. Bring the laptop.

And so on and so forth... Much hysteria, but at least she knew that she was busted big time... And she didn't really argue the punishment much. She is missing out on shopping trips with her friends, countless phone calls and internet gatherings, a school dance, and other stuff in this week alone. All things she was planning on. Now, all she has is basketball, and loads of family time. No TV, phone, internet, visits with friends, allowance, etc., etc.

Mac looked into her history and saw that she was chatting with her contacts on gmail and yahoo IM. He also read some chats. Her friends have little potty mouths, that's for sure, but so far we don't think she has much of a potty mouth. I asked her why she did it, when she knew she would get caught (really, she's not a very clever little deceiver), and when the stakes were so high? And she said that she just "missed it so much". I said, "Missed what?".... She said, "Chatting."

OOOOHhhhh, internet addiction. And newly minted 12 year olds think they know it all, indeed. It's a scary WWWworld.