I'm feeling loads better than I did eleven days ago when I last blogged. I've not had a cold that bad in ages and it didn't help that I'm not supposed to take anything for it. It's still holding on a bit, but I'm mostly better...hopefully that'll mean I can think about what I want to blog better!

Last week I had a preliminary hospital appointment for Co down in England. People seem so confused as to what they're supposed to do with me that it begs the question: Does no one else move when pregnant?! Surely others must, but the transfer of my care has been so awkward and everyone has seemed slightly unsure of what tests to copy from my medical notes and what ones to retest that it feels like they've never transferred someone's care before. Thankfully it hasn't been too stressful; it's been mostly slightly confusing and amusing. Besides, I got to see Co again, which was nice. I have a picture, too, but it probably won't be up for a while 'cause I've got to get to a scanner. For those of you medically inclined and/or interested...next week I go to get an Anti-D shot since my blood is Rh negative.

We're looking forward to Matthew's vacation time in a couple weeks! We have fabulous plans, too: We're going to stay home! Fancy that, two whole weeks where we get to be in our own house here in Scotland without having to travel. Nice.

Tomorrow hails the beginning of NaNoWriMo 2008!! Yippee! More crazy novel writing coming right up! Unfortunately, I'm not going to be getting much of a start cause we're busy all tomorrow so I may not get a chance to write for the kick-off. Heh, oh well. I'm debating as to whether or not I should tell people what I'm writing or keep it a surprise. So for the moment it's staying secret. For those of you new to the concept of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo): in the month of November loads of crazy writers like me challenge themselves to write a novel that is 50,000 words, or more--all in the month of November. I did it last year for the first time and came out with a wonderful story. I was/am very pleased with how the it turned out. Since last year I've also managed to do the first edit on said story (find out more about Once Upon Imagination). So...50,000 words here I come.

We're pretty much settled in our house in England now, although that doesn't mean that the traveling back and forth has stopped. As Matthew said, we feel a bit like part of the old gentry (*very sophisticated accent* "Oh yes, I'm just going down to my house in England for a fortnight..."). We haven't gotten our Internet sorted out in England yet so I'm obviously not there at the moment. Hehe.

I've been working on getting my care transferred to England and I've been slightly surprised. I took my medical notes to the doctor's office there, but they seemed to be treating me like I've not had any care yet. Tomorrow I'll be going to the hospital for a preliminary evaluation of sorts, but I'm not sure what it will involve except that I'll be getting another ultrasound. It seems a bit silly, but I won't try to hide that I'll be happy to see Co again.

Well I was going to write more but I can't remember what it was cause I've got a cold...

Last week on Monday we got the train up to Glasgow, where we would connect to our train down to England. We've done this quite a number of times now. I had arranged for Matthew's brother to meet us in Glasgow so that I could give him some things I had for him. It would have worked well because we were going through before he needed to be at work. As we were approaching the second to last station, the train stopped and sat on the line for five minutes or so. Okay, we weren't pressed for time in our connection so it didn't really matter. Then we got to the station and proceeded to sit at the platform again. We began to wonder what was going on. The next thing we know, an announcement comes over the speaker and says the train has been canceled! Great... So everyone piles off the train and most people walk off to somewhere, seeming to know exactly what to do like this sort of thing happens all the time! Well it's never happened to me in my travels on this line so I wasn't sure and neither did Matthew. Usually there are bus replacement services for this sort of problem so we tried to find some staff to ask. When we did, they unhelpfully told us that there was no replacement service so we'd have to fend for ourselves. All the bus stops in the area were packed so there'd be no chance of us getting a direct bus to the next station in the near future. By this time, of course, I'm on the phone with J telling him what's going on and why we aren't meeting up with him yet. Well we decided to try a taxi. There weren't any in the taxi rank like there usually would be. I saw a sign for a taxi service and called the number. Me: 'Hi, I'd like a taxi to such and such a station...' Operative: 'There's a taxi rank there for you to get taxis at.' Me: 'But there's no taxis there.' Operative: "Well I'm sorry, but we can't send a taxi to the station since there's a rank.' That left me wondering: are they trying to make money or not? and why bother having a sign if you won't send a taxi when someone calls the number?! This was the most strange part of the whole ordeal in my mind.

By that time, Matthew had hatched a scheme to get us to the station in probably the quickest way, though not quick enough to meet up with J. We took a bus to Glasgow airport and then got a bus from there to the train station! Not a direct route, but we didn't have to wait in line for ages for a bus. Thankfully we were able to drop J's stuff off with a friend nearby so didn't have to carry it all the way to England and back again. And we eventually got to our destination. We were an hour late, but if we'd been a few minutes later for our next connection then we would have been two hours late. This certainly was the most eventful time I've ever had on British public transport. Thankfully it usually works.

Oh, we're hopefully getting the keys to our English house in a week. Yay. No more hotels.

Matthew's company gave us the thumbs-up a month ago to find a property for them to rent for us. We were up here for an extended period of time after that and the first time we were down again was Monday the 8th. We drove down instead of taking the train and stayed with Matthew's parents over the weekend. We came back on Wednesday because Matthew had an eye appointment with a corneal specialist yesterday, which went quite well, by the way. So I had a week and a half and was determined to find somewhere for us to rent. We wanted something within about a mile of his office, though, because with his eye health in its current state it is important for him to be able to walk to work. This limited our choice considerably, as you can imagine. We had wanted to rent a furnished house, but it became plain that there would be no way we could be that specific because the number of furnished houses on the market are small, never mind when you're looking in a one mile radius. Thinking that his company would sort something out for furniture, we soon found a two bedroom house in the right place. I viewed it and we put a deposit on it in the following days. It has since then come out that the way which Matthew's company will provide us with furniture is different than we expected, but they'll work with us anyhow. The house already has a fridge/freezer, washer, stove, and oven and we've been offered the loan of a bed from Matthew's parents so we've got the bear minimum we need anyhow. A roof, somewhere to sleep comfortably, ability to wash clothes, and prep food safely. Everything else will fall into place in time... In case you're wondering, we won't be moving out which is why we still need the furniture in our house up here for when we're home.

Driving lessons are going well. I have another one this afternoon, which I'm hoping is one of my last. I'll be glad to be finished relearning things for sure.

I've been feeling Co move around nearly everyday now. I must admit that it's certainly a weird feeling, but it's always nice to know that Co is doing well. One of the most exciting parts of the pregnancy so far was when I saw Co's nose very clearly in the 12 week scan. One of the other most exciting things happened this week: Matthew felt Co bump him. Hehe. It's nice to be able to share it and know I'm not just making things up!

Last Saturday we drove to Leeds from Matthew's parents' house to go to the armory museum there. The night before we went, Matthew went onto the museum Website and discovered that they had a special exhibition on: The Wonderful World of Weta. Weta makes movie weapons and armor. They made items for Lord of the Rings, Narnia, The Last Samurai, Peter Pan, Master and Commander, King Kong, etc, etc. They had a large display of Narnia and Lord of the Rings weapons and armor. It was pretty amazing. The Narnia display was especially spectacular, possibly partly because the lighting was better (okay, so Lord of the Rings is a dark film compared to Narnia, but it would have been nice for the room to have not been dark so we could see more detail!). The White Witch's wand and dagger are amazing in their detail. I hadn't noticed that on the movie. Also, the centars' swords were as tall as I am. WOW! In the Lord of the Rings display, there were a few things that never made it onto the movie, such as Arwen's quiver. Sorry I don't have any pictures because they weren't allowed, but if you don't believe me, you can look on the museum's Website.

Today I'm officially launching my new Web site, although it has been up and running for some time. Please go here and check it out. I have a blog on there, which says the same as my xanga blogs. If you would like to subscribe to my blog through my new Web site, simply email me on the links you'll find there and I'll put you on a list (and I'll keep your email addy private, too). There's lots of other stuff on there, too.

So...I can't believe that last week marked the halfway point until Matthew and I get to see Co, our baby, face to face. I know I haven't really blogged about it yet, but lots of people know now. If they don't, then they will soon because I'm just starting to look pregnant. It was pretty exciting last week to see the ultrasound of Co, but sad at the same time because I won't see Co again until it's born. :-\ I've seen Co three times in 20 weeks and the next 20 there will be nothing. I'm glad at least that I should feel movement soon. I felt Co move on two occasions, but that was a week  and a week and a half ago. On Tuesday, I got to hear Co's heartbeat again (second time). It was really clear and the midwife said it sounded healthy. I was also excited to know that I have a very healthy blood pressure. I've put up a page for Co on my Web site with some pictures and a time line. You can view that here. I'll update it with short, significant facts, but will have more bulky info on my blog.

Another interesting event to report was last Saturday. Matthew went fishing with the newly restarted men's group at church and I went out with two ladies to an interiors show. It was interesting, but I wondered how anyone had room in a British house for most of those things. I guess the people who have houses big enough also have wallets big enough. I just went along for the company (the ticket were free, afterall.) It was good to spend time with them. Events like that are interesting to find out what different tastes people have. Some times the findings surprise me and other times they're predictable. The best part of the day was when we went to a flower bouquet demonstration. It was free, too. Even more surprisingly, we got to keep the bouquets we made FOR FREE! WOW. So the man and woman showed us what to do and we all tried to copy what they did. It was oober fun, but so fast that it was hard to get it just the way I wanted it. But, perhaps, if I'd had more time, I would have handled it so much that I'd have ruined it. In retrospect, it didn't look too bad afterall. Here's my bouquet.

Have a nice week and weekend!