Reconnaissance

re·con·nais·sance (ri kän′ə səns, -zəns) noun an exploratory survey or examination, as in seeking out information about enemy positions or installations

I'm not sure if yesterday will go down in history as one my most yellow bellied moments or if I can take credit for my resourcefulness in the midst of crises. One thing I do know is that I shouldn't stand by the phone waiting for CSI to call asking me to guest star as their newest P.I.

So the story goes as follows. After my very gracious husband agreed to allow us to get rid of the monstrous mugo pines that have taken over our back island, I got the brilliant idea that instead of paying someone to come and remove them, I would find someone to pay me to remove them. i.e. I put an add on Craigslist announcing I would sell these mugo pines cheaply if someone would be willing to dig them out themselves. Within 6 hrs I had my buyer in hand and was pretty proud of myself for such an ingenious idea.

May 11, 2010 3:08 pm Home of Noelle Lewis - Ben calls me and tells me the buyer is not coming at 5:30 anymore, he is coming at 3:30 due to a conflict schedule, so I would need to be the one to supervise this project and collect the cash. Being the yellow bellied fool that I am, I told Ben I was too scared to deal with this man and asked if I could pretend I wasn't home. Instead of rolling his eyes (well I don't think he did) he graciously agreed knowing how timid I can be and called back our buyer to have him leave the money in the mailbox.

May 11, 2010 3:28pm Home of Noelle Lewis - The man is pulling up the road in a red truck, I hurry around the home, close the blinds, and turn off all the lights. I see him get out of the truck and his accomplice staying in the truck. I rush to the nursery (top floor right corner room) to spy while he starts to remove the mugo of his choice. After awhile he is joined by another man. This gets boring and I call Ben to discuss my spy out.

May 11, 2010 3:42pm Home of Noelle Lewis- I get suspicious of these two men, wondering how we can be sure we can trust them to pay. Instead of doing the common sense thing and going outside to show them I'm home and I'm here to collect my cash, I decide to write down their licence plate number. Hey, it can't hurt, right?

May 11, 2010 3:51pm Home of Noelle Lewis- The men carry the pine to their truck (this is still being observed while I am crouched on the floor, pulling down one slot of the blind so I have just enough room to squeeze my eye and observe what is now taking place). The men start the truck's engine and pull out of the driveway. WAIT!! I didn't see them pay. Then the thought came to mind, maybe while the first man was digging out the pine, and the second man remained in the truck, possibly he went to the mailbox to deliver the cash.

May 11, 2010 3:54pm Driveway of Noelle Lewis- I run out the front door as I see the truck vanishing out of sight and rush to the mailbox to collect my cash. I open the mailbox, no cash. I open my neighbor's (maybe they weren't crooks after all, just number challenged and left it in her mailbox). No cash in there either.

May 11, 2010 3:57pm Home of Noelle Lewis- I saunter back inside, begrudgingly pick up the phone and call Ben to report we have been the victims of a cruel Craig's List crime. I reassure him that I have their licence plate number and we should call him up, demand the money, or let him know we have him tracked. Ben reassures me that he probably just forgot to pay and will be back. I tell him I don't share his optimism but agree to wait at least an hour before calling him.

May 11, 2010 4:12pm Driveway of Noelle Lewis- I wander back out to the mailbox thinking that perhaps the money was in the very back and I just missed it. I look again and still no money. I turn around start towards the house when I hear a vehicle coming towards the home. Sure enough, a red truck. The man gets out, hands me twenty dollars, I'm speechless and all I can say is, Hi I'm Ben's wife. He smiles turns around and leaves. So much for the dull life of a housewife. I say my life is pretty interesting...or at least I make it that way.

Fish Makes Me Cry

This post is in honor of my good friend Kristen who was my encouragement for trying something new. Fish. I didn't eat fish growing up and now I want very little to do with the creatures. However, Ben and I have been trying to eat a lot more health consciously and so I decided to try to swallow some addition Omega-3 fatty acids in the form of fish.

The bottom line...I cried during the entire time I ate our fish. It wasn't a full out cry, not a sob, not a weep, nor a wail. It was more of a sniffle, but this only compounded the problem because the crying made my nose run, and my nose running made me sniffle and then the fish aroma was only more intensified as I took these additional breaths. Which brought us to the point in the night when Ben asked, "Are you even allowed to be eating fish while pregnant? Isn't that one of the forbidden foods?" And the sniffle became a sob as I contemplated this statement, figuring I just did something so injurious to our unborn babe by eating fish, that the baby would be permanently damaged. I'm really hoping I can use my pregnancy hormones as the cop out on why fish would make me cry, or at least why it would create such melodramatic thoughts in my mind. Understanding the mind of a pregnant lady is not always easy, but neither is eating fish.

So here we are with the big question of what to do now. But I decided--I'm not going to claim defeat --a slipperly, slimly, squirmy little creature will not get the best of me. However, I am wondering, next week when I attempt round 2 of mastering the art of fish culinary, if anyone has some clothespins I can borrow for my nose.

Note: With a little reassuring help from google, I did learn that tilapia is on the list of low mercury fish and can be eaten twice weekly.

The Toothbrush

If I never saw a toothbrush again, I'd be a very happy woman. I might be a friendless woman, and my husband may never kiss me again, but at least I wouldn't have to relive the horrors I experienced today. Every day since work has ended I've been checking things off my to-do list and today I decided to tackle the refrigerator. Well, the bleach water solution and rags just weren't doing the trick, so I got an old toothbrush and went at it. Three hours later and probably some callouses from scrubbing so hard, I was finished.

Now for the part of the story I can't believe I'm publicly revealing...
Some days I get done with the housework and think, "Hmm, I bet not a single soul (except for maybe Ben) even has a hint of an idea of the meticulous, OCD inspired, travail I have just endured." So to appease my disconcerted mind, I took pictures of the before and after of the fridge project. No...I'm not that pathetic to post pictures (not to mention my friends would probably never eat at my house again if they saw the before pictures) but just to keep them for a day or two and remind myself of two things, "It's good to be a housewife!" and "Label that toothbrush so it does not by mistake ever enter another human mouth again."

Highlights from the Second Trimester

For anyone who has experienced pregnancy, or for all of you out there who continously hear about all the horrific, too detailed, every second updates about pregnant women (therefore feeling like you have experienced this thing called pregnancy) ... you'll realize that I must have been in my second trimester from Jan - April as that is the time when you get a whirlwind boost of energy and therefore become Ms. Fix It, Ms. Social, Ms. I Can Do It All and therefore neglect your blog.

Highlights from Jan would have included snow, dreariness, and boredom.

Highlights from Feb would have included:

-an amazing trip to see Amy in Chicago
-quality time with Megan on the plane
-Ben spilling paint all over the carpet during his painting marathon just so he could surprise me with a painted nursery
- Ben's last MBA class ever, giving me a life again on Monday nights besides Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy

Highlights from March would have included:

- free tickets to the Sabres game from a very kind coworker of Ben's
- a surprise getaway to Niagra Falls, Canada schemed up from my wonderful husband
- a $20 souvenior from Canada also known as a parking ticket (apparently Canadians are cheap and only have one parking meter for a whole row of cars rather than individual meters, therefore making it very easy for two intelligent college graduates (one with an MBA) to both overlook the meter
- my first gambling experience (calm down everyone it was with fake money and it was for a charity event, no my pregnancy hormones have not led me to the dark side)

Now Ms. Fix It is becoming Ms. Clumsy, Ms. Social is trading her name in for Ms. Too Tired to Socialize and Ms. I Can Do It All has requested a new title Ms. Can You Do It For Me Ben. However, the good news is that you all will once again have some very un-entertaining blog posts.

The Photo Booth

I think if I got a million dollars handed to me today...one thing I would have to do is buy a photo booth for my home. Too much fun!

Letting the Secret Out

I’ve always thought I was good at keeping secrets but it wasn’t until this fall that I was really tested. Ben and I found out we were expecting at the beginning of November and despite being uncontrollably excited we decided to wait until Christmas to tell our friends and family. I’m convinced, however, that my family was subconsciously doing everything possible to get the secret out. My parents were offering to take us with them to the Philippines in July and were waiting to hear our answer. Even though I’ve heard the glorious stories from my sister about Filipino hospitals (like having to buy your own IV bags and drive 20 miles to pick them up) I decided taking a trip in July just wasn’t going to work into our 2010 summer plans, but we couldn’t let them know this until Christmas. After being asked several times if we knew whether we would go on the trip Ben and I decided we should just spill the beans early and let them know that Little Baby Lewis couldn’t make that trip in July so we would have to go another year.

So the weekend before Thanksgiving on the spur of the moment we decided to let Mom and Dad Lucas know they were going to be grandparents. We rushed to the store and bought a little outfit that says, “Who needs Santa when you have Grandma” and we bought a Happy Thanksgiving Grandpa card for my dad. So that is how Grandma and Grandpa Lucas heard the news.

It was so tough to keep the secret from my sister, as we would Skype every Wednesday morning and I would be ready to expel my breakfast due to morning sickness but couldn’t let on. One Wednesday however I decided it was time to tell. My sister often give me a mini language lesson and teaches me a few words in Tagalong. So after a quick review I told her I wanted to pick out the words this week. So I proceeded to ask her how to say baby. Her eyebrows raised and she answered bata. I said no…infant. She then looked up the word and gave me a reply. Did she get it yet? I wasn’t sure so I went for the grand slam and asked how to say aunt. A big smile came across her face and we celebrated over Skype.

Ben was in charge of how to tell his family, all eight of them. Knowing his family’s love for word games, he came up with his own. Before we all sat down to Thanksgiving dinner we wrote up name cards in code for each person. We took the first letter of their first and middle names and then added a prefix. So there was A.L.R. and A.B.L. and A.G.L. and A.H.L and so on with the A’s all standing for aunt of course. Then there was G. De and G. Do, being Grandma Debbie and Grandpa Doug. Ben was D.B. for Daddy Ben and M. N. for Mommy Noelle. We told them they couldn’t have dinner until they figured out the code. After a good while (especially when tummies are hungry) Ben’s mom finally gasped “I know it…you’re pregnant.” Eyebrows furrowed around the table as the sisters still couldn’t put it together how A.H.E. and A.H.D. meant their sister in law was pregnant, but it quickly came together for them too.

Well if you’re exhausted reading this just think how exhausting it was keeping a secret for over a month. Thankfully there will be no more secrets for a while, with the one exception….is Baby Lewis a boy or a girl….and only God knows that one.

Here's a picture. I'm 13 weeks in that picture but I think I'm cheating a little because my back is arched.

Dishwasher Story - (posted by ben)

our ancient dishwasher was on the brinks of dying, so i couldn't resist the $125 rebate and 10% off coupon for Lowes to get the Dishwasher down from $400 to $215. if you're observant or have met me for any length of time you'll likely have realized that Noelle calls me a money nazzi for a reason. i'm cheap. so i wasn't about to let Lowe's sell me their $99 installation.

7pm last night a $200 installation fee even was sounding pretty attractive after i was drenched with water.. I had shut off the waterline under the sink as the directions said, but didn't realize the water supply line wasn't coming from the sink (as normal dishwasher supply lines do) but from the basement. so as i became a human sponge Noelle ran down stairs while I frantically tried to guide her to the main water shut off to.. you guessed it, shut it off. once everyone's mind cleared, and i successfully got my thumb wedged over the spurting pipe as the human sponge had been filled to capacity, i was able to give coherent instructions to Noelle as to where the water shutoff is and which direction to turn the handle... then i asked her to bring a bottle of shampoo up - can't waste all that water i was holding!

3 hours later and one trip to home depot and back, i'd gotten the tubes and fittings i needed to finish the job, the instructions that accompanied the dishwasher long since discarded and replaced with a walking and talking fix-it genious - my sister in law, Holly. when all is said and done, i got a bath a day earlier than i would have otherwise, saved $99, got a high that no one should get over installing a dishwasher, but i'm still overflowing with a sense of accomplishment, and most best of all, had a great time working next to my sister in law - the brains and COUGH brawn COUGH of the operation. hey, i have to give credit where credit's due :)