A Little of This, A Little of That

It's been a busy day, ergo the late entry.

So my mother is in town; she helped my aunt come up for a visit to visit her granddaughter (my cousin, S---, had the baby about a month ago), so even though they arrived Saturday night, we didn't see them until mid-morning on Sunday when we picked both of them up at the hotel and took them to my cousin's. (My aunt has some mobility issues and therefore can't stay at S---'s house.)

We had a nice visit and got to see the baby a bit before taking my mom away for a few days. Since S--- is in Georgetown, we drove back to Maryland via the Mall, stopping to check out the new National WWII Memorial. Despite the water elements of the memorial not being operable until the formal dedication Memorial Day weekend and some of the bas-relief sculptures not being fully installed, it really was an impressive memorial.

I have to admit, I was among those who opposed the initial design for the memorial because of concerns of how it would violate the sightlines of the Mall, but the design -- which sunk the memorial a little bit and toned down some of the columns and arches -- really helped. It looks like it belongs, and it adds to landscape.

We then stopped at the farmers market and headed home to have a late lunch (grilled onion-tomato-cheese sandwiches). The rest of the day was just poking around the garden, listening to cicadas, and catching up. Dinner was a spinach (from the garden salad) and corn on the cob, which we roasted on the grill. (Strip off the husks and silks, paint each cob with olive oil, and grill over medium fire, turning regularly, for about 15 to 20 minutes ... yummmmmm.)

This morning was two doctor's appointments: the Level III ultrasound with the perinatologist and the 20-week check up with the OB. (As of Friday, the baby is officially half baked!) Things went well with the ultrasound, and we were officially discharged from the high-risk patient pool. The OB appointment went well, too, although Evelin wasn't 100% happy with some of the answers the doctor gave about planning for a natural birth. We're definitely still in early days and haven't done too much exploring of our options, but we are going to explore our options as far as birthing center vs. hospital go.

Since ultrasounds were, at best, rare when my brother and I were born, Evelin invited my mom to come along for the ultrasound so she could get a preview of her next grandchild and just to see what's what with pregnancy-monitoring these days. She thought it was pretty neat, definitely different from back in the late '60s/early '70s.

After the appointments, Evelin and mom dropped me off at work and went shopping for a while. After all that, we met back up for dinner at Lupo's in College Park, and now I'm very full.