Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Crab season begins this summer...

Baby P (or Bean, or Monkey, or Peanut as we have been known to call "it" since we aren't finding out if "it" is a boy or a girl) is due to make its grand entrance sometime in mid July, making it a Cancer baby a.k.a. a Crab. While I'm a Capricorn and big P is a Gemini, I love Cancerians (is that even a word?). My sister, good friend in Australia, former boss/now friend, and a few other folks near and dear to my heart were all born under the sign of the Crab. They're just all around cool people. And I'm pleased as punch that the newest/upcoming member of our family will most likely join that esteemed crowd of all around cool people. Because as we all know, Monkey will be cool simply by association.

So, riding a bit on faith that baby P will not come more than three weeks early or 10 days late, I bought a little outfit to showcase my sense of pride at the upcoming arrival of Crab season. And I don't care if Monkey is a girl and the outfit is blue. We've already established that the baby is cool, and cool people can do just about whatever they want and be even cooler. Besides, haven't you heard? Blue is the new pink.

Introductions

What's this "3 Ps and a Dog" thing all about anyway? Well, it's all quite simple. First, our last name starts with the letter P. Pretty baseline if you're not so much of a creative type like myself. The 3 Ps consist of big P (my husband), little P (that's me) and baby P (who is still in the process of baking). Dog is quite obvious. He's a dog as you can see from the post below. And I liked the play on words "three peas in a pod" since we're kind of a tight-knit unit here in the P household. So there you have it - "3 Ps and a Dog" - we're just one not so big happy family.

But there is also a back story to the P theme that deserves a mention. Before I officially became a P, my future husband was waxing poetic one night about this fantastic team building exercise he used to do with new teams at work. It was really a personality typing test, along the lines of a Myers-Briggs test, where people were categorized into one of four main groups. Each group was assigned a corresponding letter (one of which was "P") and then sub-categories, additional letters, etc., etc., etc.

Suffice it to say, with my short attention span, I immediately glommed on to the concept of a "P" personality, which had something to do with a person wanting to always have harmony, balance and peace with all people. Someone who doesn't like confrontation and would rather compromise to keep all persons happy. Someone who would rather another person make decisions to ensure the balance of harmony and peace.

"Go no further," I said. "That's me. I'm a P."
"But you have to take the full test to see who you really are," he said.
"I don't care. I've decided. I'm a P."
"Oh, all right," he said. "You're a P. You're just a little P. Be that way."

Now, aside from the glaringly obvious - this is an example of the fact that conversations in our house would clearly bore most people to tears - if you think about it, my end of the conversation exhibited the opposite of what a P really embodied. But that's too bad. I'm a P, so just deal with it.

The beauty of being a P is that when I really don't feel like making a decision (Where to go to dinner? What should we do on Saturday night? Do you like blue or green better?), I can always lean on my P-ness and say "Honey, remember that I'm just a little P. I don't know and I don't care." Which if you knew anything about me at all, you would know that I really do care and I really do have an opinion about most everything. Sometimes, though, a girl just wants to be told what to do. So I have created my own realm of cop-out-ness that I can lean on when I'm having a moment whereby someone can tell me what the right decision is and all will still be right with the world.

Welcome to the life of the 3 Ps and a Dog.

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Chairs are cozy

The Dog contingent of the "Three Ps and a" was adopted through a rescue organization a little more than three years ago. He was not what one would describe as calm, relaxed or even cuddly. More like the Tasmanian devil. However, given our incessant need to treat him like a human and demand that he accept attention from us and like it thank-you-very-much, he's turned into the best, softest, most huggable dog on the planet. And now he owns the chair in our living room. As evidenced by the fact that these photos were taken on different days, at different times. I love our Dog.






Monday, February 18, 2008

Look ma, I can move!

Getting ready for baby:
Step 1 - Make baby
Step 2 - Grow baby
Step 3 - Spend more money than you ever thought possible on things you never even knew existed... Today we are spending our cash on new closet configurations for baby. But where are we supposed to put all the stuff that it already in the closet?

On a related baby note, we had our mid-pregnancy ultrasound last week and were truly amazed at our Monkey's development. It moves! It kicks its head! It has big feet!

[Update: the truly adorable photos of Monkey's feet and cherub-like face have been removed due to the fact that there was too much personally identifiable information on the photos. And I'm not technically savvy enough to edit the personal details out. Stay tuned...]