The bullet points

• Today I start my third trimester.  The past six - almost seven - months have simultaneously been the longest and shortest of my life.  How can it feel like last August was years ago and weeks ago at the same time?  I can't explain it but it does.  And the 12-13 weeks that loom ahead feel similarly like they'll never end and will be over in an instant.  I'm trying to embrace every moment because it may just be a once-in-a-lifetime experience.  (And if I'm being totally honest I don't know how sad I'd be if that turns out to be the case.  We'll see how I feel about it in a year or so.)
• I hate unsolicited advice.  I'm no stranger to it of course, and I'm sure you aren't either, but I think it's only going to get worse now that I'm about to be a first time mom.  Everyone who already has a kid will be coming out of the woodwork to tell me the "right" way to do things, and it has already started.  You make one innocuous comment about how cute baby shoes are and someone has to chime in with what brand you should buy because otherwise you will destroy your kid's feet.  I get it, they're probably just trying to be helpful, and maybe it was something they didn't know until they had kids.  But I hate the general school of thought that just because someone doesn't have kids means they know nothing about them.
• I think I mentioned that Hubs and I are doing the Bradley method for our birth class.  We've been going for a few weeks now and I like it, except that it's kinda boring.  If you don't know anything about Bradley, basically its focus is on natural childbirth, understanding how to work with your body during labor and birth, and learning relaxation methods to help you through the pain (similar to the meditation methods I've been practicing for the past couple years).  As you might expect, my class is half-filled with hippie granola types who are planning home births.  I'm not planning a home birth, although after being in the class for a few weeks I can definitely see the appeal, so more power to them.  I'm with the other half of the group planning regular ol' hospital births; just hoping I can make it through without pitocin or an epidural or (god help me) a C-section.  I don't have strong feelings about how women in general "should" give birth, but I feel that for me, if at all possible, I'd like to experience it as it is, and I believe that my body will be able to handle it (or be handled by it).
• My job is still going really well, still learning a lot, still like my coworkers and my boss.  Actually my boss is pretty freaking amazing.  She keeps offering me hand-me-downs, which I will gladly take off her hands.  Plus, the other day she told me that if my schedule (9:30-6:30) isn't convenient after the baby is born that she's okay with me switching to earlier hours.  Ummm... freaking amazing!  I didn't even have to ask, but I had been thinking about it.  After three years of torture at my last job, I didn't believe that places like this (and bosses like her) even existed anymore.  
• I'm still working weekends with the DJ too, and it is exhausting!  It's bridal show season so that's what I've been doing most Sundays for the past month.  I don't mind so much, except that it's sales, sales, sales, and I am just not a salesperson.  I'm an introvert.  I don't like striking up conversations with random people, I get flustered when I feel like I'm trying to sell someone something, and for the life of me I can't close a sale, which at these shows just means getting a potential client to book an appointment.  (Which you would think would be easy because why else are these brides there except to find vendors for their weddings?  But a surprising amount of them act like they don't want anyone to talk to them.)  It's starting to stress me out.  But they pay me whether or not I book any appointments and it's only for another month and we really need the money, sooo...  I will suck it up and try to make the best of it.
• Baby shower planning mode is on, and we've decided on a casual, co-ed, open house style shindig instead of a traditional shower.  I'm excited!  We can invite lots of people this way and it won't be weird for the guys because the games are all set up to be optional with no timeline, and I won't be opening gifts.  
• Okay that's all I can think of for now unless you want to hear about how Atticus has been using the (lid-less) litter box we got for Scout, missing the litter and peeing all over my walls and floors from inside the box.  Never a dull moment...