Merry, Merry

Courtesy of the immensely talented and lovely Ashley Brooke Designs*, who designed the Pretty creation above, I virtually send you this card with my sincere for once wishes for a wonderful holiday season - and as a reminder that my dog is more gifted & talented, not to mention better looking, than yours.

*PC / SECRET BLOG POLICE DISCLAIMER: This is not a paid plug. I bought these cards with my hard-earned cash money. Uh, Merry Christmas!

Notes from the Elastic Waistband Front

As a welcome distraction from humiliating myself, I ventured out in the Trophy Wife Wagon last Friday for a virgin shopping voyage* - my first maternity boutique shopping trip. As I'm just now emerging from that hideous pregnant lady limbo in which I fit into neither my regular nor maternity clothes, I've recently bought some maternity wear online & naively assumed that an in-person adventure would be just as secretly exhilarating as it had been from behind my MacBook screen.

*As in, my first time shopping for something, not purchasing actual virgins. This isn't some crap Liam Ne*eson flick. Mmm, Liam Ne*eson ...

If you'll forgive me the unholy Smug Married / Mothery mashup here, please raise your hand if you current or former brides recall your first time visiting a snooty bridal boutique. You know the kind - as soon as you cross that dimly lit, overpriced threshold, all eyes dart to your left hand, in some bizzaro, bridal world secret handshake evaluation. Once the sales staff - who inevitably fall into two categories:

(1) teenage whippet who is no more capable of understanding your desire to find a hip-flattering gown than she is of explaining Leighton M*eester's singing career; and

(2) middle-aged harpy spackled with generous amounts of Mary Kay and judgment

- assess that you are both engaged and of a carat $$$ize worthy of entrance, one of them may descend upon you in a heated sales pitch. If, however, you somehow fail this Secret Carat Test, you are left to roam those intimidating isles of tulle and lace alone, questioning whether you are actually engaged in the first place.

It having been a few years since my last specialty boutique foray, I blithely sauntered into the maternity store, only to encounter an entirely non-pregnant, possible pre-adolescent employee and yet another secret handshake Look of Judgment, this one including assessment of both carat $$$ize and the size of my baby bump (still wee, for those keeping track). While I imagine that last evaluation marks also some form of self-preservation - how many of us (I) have learned the hard way not to assume someone is pregnant, unless you're 100% certain? - I evidently had failed the invisible exam, as said Teenage Whippet proceeded to ignore me entirely and assist the other, more obviously knocked-up clientele.

As I finally slunk up to the counter with my purchase - as much as I hate to give money to these snooty boutiques, so often they're the only source in town for whatever unguent or bauble I absolutely need - I comforted myself by observing with no small amount of pettiness that the Teenage Whippet, slim and painfully stylish as she might be, also had a case of adolescent acne. Because I may rapidly be losing my waistline and my memory, but By God at least I'm no longer in high school.

More from behind the enemy, estrogen-soaked lines as I learn it . . .

Guest (Re-) Post at "The Coconut Diaries"

Hilarious blogger & dear Invisible Internet Friend The Coconut Diaries - who I profiled here as a Feature Friday blogger - is off cruising around this week, so I'm recycling one of my favorite old posts on her blog. Why lazily use an old post, you may ask? Because I am totally playing the Pregnancy Card while I can. Nanny nanny boo boo.

I always hesitate to link to Miss Coconut's blog because I happen to know that both in blogging and in real life, she is much nicer, funnier, and better accessorized than me. Nevertheless, because I am just that awesome, Pretty please go check out my guest post here, and then stick around and read her far superior writing too.

Happy weekend / pretending-to-focus-at-work-pre-Christmas, dolls!

A Pregnant Lady Walks Into a Party . . .

First, thank you *so* much for all of your lovely comments, emails, and Tweets! Even this cold-hearted Ice Queen has been thawed by your overwhelming outpouring of support. From the bottom of my - uh, womb? - thank you.

Second, in sympathy with the non-pregnant, non-kid singleton or married types reading the following story, this is much more about my being an ass than being pregnant. Sadly, I've found the latter does nothing to eradicate the former.

***

Amongst my many pre-pregnancy jitters, I admit that one of my worries was, "What does a party look like for this shy type wino without the assistance of my kind friend, Cabernet*?" To my surprise and relief, navigating the social waters during these first few months of enforced sobriety has been much less miserable than I'd expected (dodging nosy questions about my sudden teetotaling notwithstanding).

*Baby names being what they are nowadays, I feel compelled to add that I'm speaking about Cabernet the wine varietal, not the inevitable exotic dancer of similar name. Oy.

So it was, all Smug Mothery, that I strolled into a large family birthday party last Saturday night, confident that this would be another festive evening full of my new favorite hobby, i.e. making fun of people getting sloshed. By "people" I should clarify that this particular fete of 60 included extended in-law family, Catholic clergy members, and my boss (who doubles as family friend).

As certified members of the Mommy Mafia can attest, the close friends or family members sworn to secrecy about early pregnancy news fall into two camps - (a) those who understand your desire to keep things quiet and comply easily and (b) those who literally seem to burst under the pressure of the secret, growing wild-eyed as they look for someone, anyone to drag the secret out of them. I'll let you surmise in which camp the Anonymous In-Laws, wonderful though they are, fell. Suffice it to say, by the day of this party, they were, uh, very excited to share the finally public news.

So as we sat down for dinner, I had an inkling that some sort of humiliating rousing toast to my fertility was coming, but me & Denial go back much farther than this baby business. Alas, not two minutes after the Anonymous Father-In-Law began his entertaining pre-dinner toast, the Anonymous Husband was suddenly called upon to "deliver the Good News"*.

*"Good News" is to pregnancy as "Big Day" is to weddings - totally overused and annoying. Let's agree to end it now. Thank you for your cooperation.

The AH, being a person of poise and great public speaking ability (*foreshadowing!*), stood and briefly told the room that we are expecting. The crowd politely applauded, the AH sat, and I breathed a sigh of relief, hopeful that we could now move on to the birthday guest of honor.

AND THEN - that's right, I'm going All Caps for a moment - the Anonymous Father-in-Law turned to me and inquired, "Mel, do you have anything to add?", as he grinned at the audience.

I, being a person neither of great poise nor public speaking ability, promptly turned to the crowd and proclaimed while nodding towards the AH:

"Uh, he did a great job!"

After a surprised pause, the room burst into laughter, and the AH beamed from ear to ear at me as if I'd offered him a gift-wrapped Megan F*ox for Christmas. I slowly slunk down into my chair as I turned to the AH, my face aflame as my words echoed through my head, and asked through gritted teeth,

"Did I just announce to the entire party that you did an impressive job of impregnating me?"

The unbridled & all too smug enthusiasm on his face confirmed my worst fears, which no amount of "mocktails" could assuage. As the shame of my Uptight White ancestors rung in my ears, horrified as they surely were at my having admitted to having s-e-x (as it was spelled out in my childhood home) (never mind that it was with my own personal husband), I tried to comfort myself with these thoughts - (a) surely I'll never be asked to give an impromptu speech at family events again? and (b) my "push present" had best be in the Hope Diamond category after this inadvertent AH ego boost.

And that, darlings, is how I accidentally informed a party full of approximately 10 nuns, one priest, my boss, my in-laws, and some 40-odd other people that my husband is a good lay. Merry Christmas!

Excuses. 13 Weeks of Them.

My faithful readers - all three of you - may have noticed my absence around these here parts. Admittedly, it's been a lengthy one, about the length of a . . . trimester.

Darlings, I find myself needing to violate the very State of the Uterus address we set forth here & announce that my absence has been due to my, um, well - my uterus being occupied. I'm in the family way. Bun in the oven and such. Pregnant, 13 weeks so.

Not only has this happy condition caused me to, you know, spend a lot of time contemplating my Uterus State, my body has basically demanded that I rest and relax versus blog over the past few months. And by "rest and relax", I of course mean "eat everything that isn't mobile, or at least not fast enough that I can't catch it."

A warning to my happily child-free friends - as much as I'll endeavor to avoid such scintillating topics as fundal height or prenatal preschool applications, things could be a little (a lot) progesterone soaked around here for the forseeable future. Although I pledge to try and deviate from all things gestation, I also can't quite focus on my usual Pretty style concerns yet. *Not* that I'm any less vain - let's not be ridiculous. Rather, I just can't get excited about that in which I can increasingly no longer fit.

(If you turn your monitor sideways, squint, and chant "HORMONES!" three times, you can kinda sorta make something out there. I'm certain this has nothing to do with the peppermint ice cream I've been hoovering.)

On the bright side, you know what this whole pregnancy thing means, don't you? SMUG MOTHERHOOD!

(Dear Pregnancy Gods: Psych! Just kidding about that Smug Motherhood bit! Please do not smite me with any other delightful pregnancy symptoms. For serious. Well, except for the, uh, enhanced chestal bits, for which the AH thanks you profusely and rather annoyingly. xoxo)