I’ve been trying to keep up with the Olympics, and watching as many of the live competitions as possible. It’s hard, though, as I’m sure many of you know, since many of them are being held during the wee hours of the night. I saw most of Michael Phelps’ gold medal swims, and most of May-Marsh’s volleyball wins, and even most of the gymnastics routines. However, it has become increasingly hard for me during the tail end of the Olympics to keep up, given Bean’s bedtime routine. Dave and I have decided to start introducing her to a regular bedtime routine — bath at 10:30pm, last dinner feeding, then off to bed in our bedroom in her bassinet. By 11:30p to midnight, she should be sound asleep, and shouldn’t wake up until 10:30am the next day except two or three times to feed during the middle of the night. It has gone very well over the last week. She still protests when I put her down and leave her alone in our bedroom in the dark (”SQUAWK!! HOLD ME, LOVE ME!!!”) but the squawks have become less in frequency and duration, so we can’t complain. She’s been treating me very well during late-night feedings, only awake long enough to eat, and then I put her down after her burp and a diaper change. All done within half an hour. What an adorable, lovely child we have.

Anyway, the Olympics. Did you hear about the latest rumored scam from the Chinese? Apparently, a few of their athletes were given fake birth certificates in order to compete, specifically in the gymnastics competition. At least one of the girls is apparently only 13 years old, and you have to be at least 16 to compete in the Olympics. If it’s true (and forgive me, I haven’t really researched this rumor thoroughly yet), it’s rather sad. The Chinese is in top standing as far as gold medals go, and we all know how dedicated they are when they put their minds on something. But geez, not at the hands of cheating. It just puts down the whole Olympics altogether. It’s sad. To me, this is as highly intolerable as athletes taking steroids or taking diet pills that work just to lose weight to compete. Come on, that’s not what the Olympics is about. It’s about friendly sportsmanship, being the best you can be naturally, working hard, going for the gold for the world (and not just for your country).

Anyway, I’m still enjoying the games. I can’t wait to watch May-Marsh’s finals tonight!

One of the many treats that I’ve come to love is going to the movies. I don’t get to go very often because I don’t really have a movie buddy. It’s a treat for me, when Dave goes to the movies with me. He likes renting DVDs and being in the comfort of home while watching a movie rather than having to go out and sit in a hard little chair in one spot for two hours with strangers we don’t know. I can understand his viewpoint, but I don’t know what it is about going to the movies that brings out the giddiness in me. I guess it’s because when I was still living at home with my parents, they never let us go out to the movies. I think we may have went once in all my time growing up, and they saw it as a waste of money. So I always waited until I moved out to go to any movie I wanted. In college, my movie buddy was Will, and we used to go almost every weekend, at least. Sometimes we went a few times a week. Sure it’s a bit more expensive than renting out, but the treat is still there… going to buy the ticket, getting the popcorn from one of those popcorn machines, finding our seats, staring at the giant big screen in front of us — it’s all good.

I keep trying to convince Will to move up here so I can have my movie buddy back, but so far it’s not really working. Darn him being in SoCal and all.

Boy oh boy, I can’t wait until we have maternity/paternity leave. Dave and I will be spending a good few months not working after Bean is born. And since thats towards the middle of summer to autumn, I think we’re going to have lots of choices on what we want to do with our newborn baby. Right now, I’m perusing through some vacation deals to see what we’ve got out there. I hope this summer is really, really sunny too, so that we can spend a lot of time outdoors, with the sun on our faces. I’m tired of all this rain and cloud over here. We’ve had a few days of sunshine, but that was about it. You gotta really learn to appreciate the rain when you’re living in lower mainland B.C., I think. Otherwise, it wouldn’t work out so well.

I can’t wait till Bean is here. I can’t wait to kiss her all over and hold her near and sing her lullabies. I just can’t wait.

We’re going to have so much fun together, all four of us (with Tink, of course — can’t forget the spoiled kitty who’s a part of our family!). It will be so much fun.

I am so anxious to get back to my regular hardcore yoga routine — twice a week every week. It really did my body and mind good. I get the mind stuff in my prenatal, and the breathing exercises, but I’m missing all the really wonderful, strenuous poses I used to do. I can’t wait to get back into it. And then to introduce Bean, too. Mommy & Me yoga, here we come! Somehow, I’ve always needed a yoga instructor, versus doing them on my own with a yoga dvd. I don’t have that much discipline, apparently. Maybe one day, I will even become a teacher. I love yoga. I love yoga a LOT. Heh. I’m a yoga nerd.

Dave and I talk a lot about traveling to far and lovely places with Baby Bean after she’s born and a little older. It’s exciting to talk about the potential trips we’d be making, from close places like Harrison Hot Springs to Vietnam. We definitely want to go to Vietnam. For one thing, Dave hasn’t been there yet, and I really want him to see the place where I was born. It’s also important to the both of us that Bean sees where she comes from. I remember my first trip back to Vietnam, when I was 15. It was such a surreal experience, to be able to touch and see the people and the land where I was born. It makes it more real. I want Bean to experience that. It’s a beautiful country and I want to have her see it and experience it for herself too. Especially since we have so many relatives there who will just eat her up and protect her and love her. Though, of course, with our growing family, I’m sure we’ll need lots more Rimowa luggage! No worries though.

Ahh, Baby Bean, the things you’ll see, the places you’ll be! It’s all so exciting!

Boy I’ve neglected this site for a couple days, haven’t I? Not much new to report, just little stuff here and there. Last weekend was really busy, and I got a lot of things done. Jen R. came over on Saturday for a little visit, and then on Sunday, Candice came over. That was really cool. We played the Wii for the first time ever (she brought her console over). We’re now addicted and we have sworn to get one for ourselves here. Bowling and tennis are the most fun, but so was Super Mario Party. That was a load of fun. It’s awesome being able to physically interact with the games you’re playing. That bit of physical exercise does a body good. They’ve found a way to get the video game geeks to do some exercise. I totally approve, yo.

I also did a lot of house cleaning over last weekend. We tried out the robo vac, and much to our lovely surprise, it works wonderfully. I tried cleaning out some of the closets in the hallway, but they were so full of tools and other crap that I got discouraged. I ended up doing laundry and dusting instead (when I do laundry and dust, that’s when I’m really discouraged :P). I think we need a tool storage shed in our next home, or something.

Now that we’re pregnant, I’ve been really keeping my eyes open about deals, coupons, and sales. Everything has to be cheap cheap cheap because we want to save as much money as we can for medical bills and for baby supplies. Nothing too good for our baby, but everything else seems to be too expensive when it comes to shopping for us. Weird how that mind just shifts. So finding Coupon Chief is a great thing for me. Everything from dell products to Target items, which are some of my favorite places to shop. Target has a lot of really cute baby stuff, so that should be great too.

Besides that, Valentine’s Day is coming up, along with our anniversary just two days before that. I usually go to Target to get some lovely craft supplies and make a card for Dave (I loooove making homemade cards), so Coupon Chief will be very handy indeed around this time of year.

I’m working on several different projects that I will be able to concentrate more on once I’m on maternity leave (which I am predicting to actually start around my 8th month of baby-making). Eventually, I will be re-doing a bit of mindmirror.net and making it into a project site (at least part of the site anyway) and putting in a shopping cart for people to buy various things off of me. These things will include jewelry, photography, knitted items, and drawings. I’m excited to get back to my hobbies. I haven’t had a lot of time to do this, so I have a lot of plans. I’ve made some things but I never got around to actually advertising. I want to showcase my work. AShop is the best way to allow me to do so. They have a really good shopping cart system, that’s easy to use and dependable. I can’t wait to get started!

I know a lot of people in construction. My father was a construction worker when I was growing up, and I remember sometimes going to the job site and watching him work — putting in windows, building doors, setting up walls for extra bedrooms. I was always so fascinated that something beautiful can be created out of nothing — or practically nothing. When I was 10, I was very interested in apprenticeships and how I can become my father’s apprenticeship. I thought it would be so neat being on the job site, big and strong. Heh. Well, now if I ever wanted to pursue that brief childhood dream of mine, I can at least get some training information from cskills.org on construction work. I have a lot of respect for people in that field: they have to know what they’re doing, but they’re also doing something that is pretty high risk and unsafe. All to build homes for people to live in, and businesses for people to work in.

I’ve recently found an awesome Great Discovery: www.ZenniOptical.com. If you know me at all, you know I have an addiction for glasses. Different types of glasses. I’m always looking to see what new style I should wear when I get my next pair of glasses. Granted, I don’t get them very often (maybe once every two years), but that doesn’t stop me from looking! I was going through ZenniOptical and boy oh boy there are so many selections they’ve got, and they have prescription glasses online too. I’m officially addicted. I just got my latest pair of glasses last February, and now I want another one? Heh. These ones are still pretty new, and I love them, but I just can’t help wanting another pair, maybe a quirky one, something more dramatic, something less “Helen” (which, when it comes to glasses, means: boring, safe, ordinary :P). Maybe my next pair will be a little more stylish!