And it begins…

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We went in for our second appointment with Dr. S this morning. Everything is coming along great! Dr. S seemed quite impressed that Elise is having very mild symptoms. She hasn’t had morning sickness although her hunger fits come on suddenly and earlier this week she started getting the occassional headache.

We got to hear our baby’s heartbeat for the first time. That was the most gorgeous sound I’ve ever heard. A perfect rhythm and a healthy 160 beats per minute!

Elise had blood drawn to determine blood type, antigens and immune system analysis. I think there were a couple other reasons but I was still too excited having just heard the heartbeat that I can’t seem to remember.

We then went into the ultrasound room for our second ultrasound. Dr. S was scanning around looking for something and zoomed right past the baby. She kept talking and panning around and jokingly said, “Oh yeah, I guess you want to see the baby!”

She got a great view for us and we could clearly make out the head, body, arms, fingers and legs. Our baby treated us to the best Axl Rose “Sweet Child O’ Mine” dance ever! It was in there just moving it’s little shoulders and arms and swinging it’s legs around. That’s my kid!

It was so exciting that I’m at a loss for words. It’s amazing how something so small (literally) can make your heart swell so big.

The past couple weeks have been ho-hum in Dad-to-be land. I attribute that to still being very early on in the pregnancy and that there hasn’t been a huge physical difference in Elise. After our doctor’s visit today I am baby-charged and pumped again!

Q. What do model train sets and women’s breasts have in common?

A. Both are intended for children, but it’s the fathers that always end up playing with them.

Kerry suggested I try out the China Gold website to get a guess on the sex of our baby. Here are the results:

You entered mother’s birthday Sunday, February 09, 1975 and child’s birthday Friday, April 21, 2006

We calculated the child’s conception date was Friday, July 29, 2005 by subtracting the gestation of pregnant 266 days from the birthday.

According to your information, mother’s Virtual Lunar Age at the conception was 32 years old (Note: The Lunar age is usually 1 or 2 years older than mother’s actual age) and the conception month was Lunar June. Personal Baby Chart indicates Girl. See the chart below.

Elise and I aren’t going to find out the sex of the baby until the day. This surprises a lot of people. I always thought I would embrace technology and know the sex of my children before birth until I married Elise. I think it’s fun to not know. There are too few surprises in this world that you can “control”, so we’re keeping the sex of the baby a surprise.

Most people think we’re having a boy. Steve (my Father-in-law) and I have a feeling that our first born will be a girl.

What do you think?

One of my employees had to take the day off today because her little girl is sick. She brought her daughter in this afternoon on the way to the doctor. She’s a cute little 9-month-old girl who I think looks like her dad. I’ve only seen her dad two, maybe three, times but can definitely see the similarities.

This is fascinating for me because I have never been able to determine parent and young offspring similarities. I still can’t see similarities among my Godson and his parents.

I called a meeting at work on Monday. I began the meeting by letting everyone in on the going ons as of late. I then swallowed and said, “… and, uh, Elise is pregnant.” I looked at everyone in the eye as I was saying that short sentence. My eyes fell on Lacee as I completed my sentence and she immediately looked away. I worried for a moment and then someone chimed in and said, “Yeah, we already knew…”

I was shocked.

I soon found out that my bosses told their daughter, who works for me, and she and Janice kind of let the cat out of the bag.

Everyone was happy for us and we chatted for a few minutes about the life changing news. It’s a relief to be able to now talk openly with everyone at the office.

My boss’s wife and the VP of the company called and left a message for me while I was out running errands.

I called her back when I got back in. She and I agreed for the three of us to meet at 4 p.m. They showed up early. I was interviewing a candidate for a marketing position.

After my interview I met with the bosses. We discussed business as needed. One topic was finally letting go of one of our outside sales guys. It was an intense conversation and it finally came to an end.

I chimed in to break the silence. It was a delayed chime in and I finally said, “Well… on a happier note…”

Long pause.

“Well… Elise is pregnant!”

To which they both loudly exlaimed their excitement. It was really great. A huge smile took over my face as my work family’s excitement ensued.

I told them about our first doctor’s visit and how far along we are. I told them about seeing the heartbeat in the ultrasound. They continued in the excitement. It was truly a happy room and I was excited.

I eventually proposed that I wanted to telecommute for a few months after the baby is born. My boss was pretty hesitant as I was making my proposal. I got a little worried at that point. I went on to reassure him that I would be easily accessible and could access our office network from the house. He still had the wrinkled forehead. I pointed out that I hired a bad ass office manager who can take care of business if I’m not around. He agreed.

All is good. All went well. The bosses were so happy for us and it was such a great feeling to not only hear of, but to actually feel their support. It’s great to be in a work environment that values family so much.

At that point it was well past 5 p.m. All of the girls left for the day except for my office manager. I went to my desk and started closing down for the day. She came over and started talking to me about something that I honestly didn’t hear because I was set on how I was going to tell her that Elise was pregnant.

When she finished her sentence I said, “Oh, and…”

She was starting to walk back to her desk and her stride was paused as she waited for me to finish what I was saying.

I paused for a moment. I looked up from my computer and looked at her. I shot a small grin and said, “Elise is pregnant.”

She squealed and walked past my desk to give me a big hug.

It was such a great feeling. I debated on waiting until after our next doctor’s appointment at the end of the month but just couldn’t hold it in.

Not only is it a great feeling, but it’s also a relief to let people know. It’s like the secret is out - I don’t have to “lie” anymore.

I want to tell everyone now. But we’re going to wait until after the end of the month.

I found out early last week that one of my new employees is pregnant. This employee told my office manager who, in turn, told me the next day. I wasn’t sure if this employee wanted me to know so I didn’t want to acknowledge the news. Then it was casually brought up later in the week and I decided to make it known that I knew. I congratulated her and took geniune interest in whatever news she wanted to disclose but had to be careful not to let on that I knew too much about pregnancy.

I had lunch brought in today because the girls are having to stock a huge order we received this morning. I like to try to keep the mood light and fun and limit our conversations to anything other than work, especially on days like today. I asked our preggers employee how she’s been feeling. She said she’s been sleeping okay but is nauseous all the time. I asked how far along she was in the pregnancy. She said, “A couple months. I think. I haven’t even been to the doctor yet.”

This will be her and her husband’s second child. She has an 8-month-old daughter. Yeah, quick turn around, eh? But I’m really happy for her. Since I can’t be around my pregnant wife during the day, at least I have a pregnant employee who’s about as far along in gestation as Elise.

I’m having the mano y mano meeting with my boss tomorrow. I thought about writing out a list to have in front of me but realized I didn’t have much to warrant a list. Luckily I have a very cool and understanding boss and it should be a nice chat. I really just want to let him know that I want to telecommute for a few months after Mini Me comes. I’m 99.9999% sure he’ll be fine with that.

I’m debating on if I want to tell the girls at the office yet. The doctor said it’s best to wait at least ten weeks. I think tomorrow will be ten weeks. Or nine weeks. I still don’t know. I’ll get it figured out one of these days. I really wanted to wait until after our second doctor’s visit on the 29th of this month to make sure we were past the first trimester.

I’m confident that Elise and baby are fine so I may just tell the girls tomorrow after my meeting. I already had a “doctor’s appointment” on the first of the month. If I have another “doctor’s appointment” in the same month, they might start worrying about me.

I hope I don’t steal my employee’s thunder. Ahhh, who cares. This is Elise’s and my first baby. I can share the thunder with my employee 60/40.

Elise and I went to Half Price Books this afternoon. I was set on finding Pregnancy For Dummies. It wasn’t there. Elise had a few other books in mind.

Elise found a few books that we need to read. We bought:

What To Eat When You’re Expecting
The Girlfriends’ Guide to Pregnancy
The Expectant Father

I found and purchased this instructional novel:

Mötley Crüe’s The Dirt.

Last weekend Elise and I went grocery shopping. I was browsing the produce section and my eye caught a jar of kimchee. Next my eye caught a package of eggroll wraps. Elise saw my eyebrows lift and she said, “Ooh, ooh, make eggrolls!”

So I put the wraps and necessary vegetables in which to make eggrolls in the shopping cart.

On Wednesday evening I pulled a pork hind quarter from the freezer to thaw. Last night I stewed the pork with vegetables and veal stock to be used as part of the filling for the eggrolls that I plan on making tonight. I left the pork simmering on the stove for a few hours so It would fall off the bone. Keep in mind, this is wild baby pig that was caught on my parents’ land. Even when cooked properly, there can still be a hint of gaminess that can linger when cooked.

I left the pot simmering in the kitchen. Elise sat in the living room and watched a rerun of ER. I went into my office and nerded out while watching Steve Jobs’ Special Event presentation on the iPod nano and the Motorola ROKR iTunes phone.

An hour into the presentation Elise walked into the office.

“Uhhh… ummmm… are you going to be cooking that stuff much longer?”

“Yeah. Probably another hour or so. Why?” I asked.

“Because that smell is making me nauseous… I think I’m going to go into the bedroom and close the door and see if that’ll will block out the smell” she said.

It wasn’t a bad smell. It smelled no different than any other time I’ve cooked wild pig.

So that was the first time I witnessed a food or smell aversion from Elise. She’s told me that the smell of cigarettes really bothers her now as well.

Things should be better tonight when I make the eggrolls. Hopefully. Or I’ll have a lot of eggrolls to eat by myself. Outside. Surrounded by citronella candles.

In other news: things are going along great for the mom-to-be. There’s not a whole lot to report as we’re just now 9 weeks along. I think. I still haven’t figured the weeks thing out yet. Elise said she has the inclination to be “bitchy” more often now. If you know Elise, you know “bitchy” really isn’t her social repertoire.

And then there is the sleep thing. Elise can sleep like a champ. She comes home from work, sits on the couch, turns on the tube and it’s pretty much lights out after that. She’s a borderline narcoleptic. I think she’s been sleeping the whole night through. She might get up once during the night to use the restroom, but I don’t think the constant need to pee has quite set in. She tells me she’s been drinking a lot of water. Maybe she’s a narcoleptic camel. Now that’s a good name for a band!

Last weekend Elise told her boss, office manager and assistant that she was pregnant. We agreed that she needed to tell them as soon as possible as her job is pretty demanding. We also agreed that Elise needs to cut back on the physical and emotional stress that her job requires. The news was well-received by the coworkers but her boss might need to be hit over the head a few times before it sets in that we’re serious about Elise scaling back on hours and stress.

I sent an e-mail to my boss today giving him and update on the happenings around the office. I manage all operations for our company so my boss isn’t around that much. We usually correspond via e-mail as needed. At the end of the e-mail that I sent I wrote, “And we need to have a mano y mano next time you’re in the office.”

I want to tell my boss as soon as possible because 1) I want it to be out as soon as possible so when I want to take time off it won’t be a surprise and 2) my boss is a pharmacist and I want to milk him for all of the free medical advice I can get!

I also want to telecommute to work for 90 days or so after the baby is born. I want to run that by him early on to see if we can work something out so I can be with Elise and the baby as much as possible. I work 60 miles from home so it’s not like I can just run home during my lunch break to see my family.