My belly is now 35 inches around and I certainly look pregnant. We had our ultrasound at the hospital at the beginning of the month. Dr. Brown usually gives me an ultrasound at our checkups, but his machine is old. It is run by a 386 processor if you can believe it. But the picture quality doesn't matter too much to us. We just want to see her. The hospital has a high tech machine and we could see some great images of her face, hands, body. At one point she opened and closed her mouth and gave us the thumbs up sign. Unfortunately, I had to go with a full bladder. Being pregnant with a full bladder and riding up our bumpy driveway was not fun. The ultrasound tech took the pictures and measurements that she needed to with my full bladder and then thankfully, she let me go to the bathroom before finishing the rest of the ultrasound. The tech was nice, but you could tell that she didn't usually do pregnancy ultrasounds because we kept having to ask what is that, what are we looking at, what are you measuring, etc. For a $370 bill, I wanted some commentary with my baby show! Todd finished sealing the bamboo floor in the baby's room and he put up the new blinds. It is starting to look like a room again. He is still fine tuning the oak piece for the threshold. We did our first baby shopping together at KMart. We bought the crib mattress, bassinette sheets and safari theme crib set. The crib set is very cute. I had always wanted frogs and turtles, but you take what you can get in Hawaii. The expensive baby boutique in the International Market had crib sets for $250 and up. I am just as happy with our KMart set. I am sure she can spit up on them with just as much as ease as with a $300 set. As a treat to my honey, we then had Little Ceasar's pizza since it is in the KMart. Next we stopped at Lowes to pick up our new washing machine that finally arrived. Usually Todd is understanding of the whole Hawaiian time thing, but he started getting very annoyed at Lowes. They took their sweet old time getting our washer out from the warehouse. Even with all of the stress of ordering the washer and waiting and waiting for it to arrive first on Oahu and then here and then for them to finally unpack the container, the washer was worth it, at least I think so. It is so nice to not have to walk over to the apartments to do my laundry and the front loader is so cool. Todd built a super sturdy stand for it so I don't have to bend over especially since bending does not work so well these pregnant days.

     We had a family from California stay with us for a week at the beginning of the month. We finally got some rain, but it was unfortunate for them. It really only rained up in coffee country. They were still able to get in the car and enjoy the beach. While Todd was away at yet another all day wrestling tournament, our first set of guests from Canada arrived. I was all confused since two cars of people arrived and I thought we were only have two people arrive. The dogs were pulling me all around and there was French and English being spoken. I had no idea what was happening. It turned out that some friends of our guests that live on the island just came by to welcome them and have dinner. Also I had a miscommunication with Todd and we were supposed to have 3 guests arrive. I will be very happy when wrestling season is over and Todd can be home for guest welcoming. We also had a short stay by a couple, Mike and Brenna, from Minnesota. They were out all the time and were very 'cool' about the refrigerator breaking down midway into their stay. The refrigerator was just purchased in March of last year so it was not even two years old. Todd spent lots of time on the phone with Lowes and various repair shops on the island that either won't do warranty work or will not drive to our area. Finally Sears from all the way in Hilo agreed to come. In the mean time, Todd figured out the problem and ordered the part.

     Both Todd and I went to the dentist this month. I refused an x-ray since I didn't want to zap the baby. I didn't have any cavities, but Todd had one so he had to go back and get it filled. Just like last year, Todd has succumbed to the festering germs from the kids at the school. He has a respiratory sickness. At least it is not the flu. He got the shot this year and hopefully that will keep him safe from the flu, but this cold definitely knocked him out. He even stayed home from a wrestling tournament so you know he was feeling bad.

     Happy Birthday to Jessica! Bless Todd's sister Lisa for having sixteen 12 year old girls sleep over at her house! Jess said she had a great time so I am sure, it was all worth it. I did some coffee tree pruning. The trees were blooming and when I tried to prune some of the trees under the mac nut trees, the bees were just too much for me. I hung up my pruning saw and have not returned. I finally cleaned up my little garden that only has herbs, lavendar and pineapples. I didn't know that I still had oregano. It was under a mass of lavendar branches. Our friend Jim brought over some horse manure mixed with coffee parchment which is supposed to be an excellent fertilizer for the coffee trees. Nothing says true friend like a guy that brings you a load of poop and then stays to help shovel it.