All shopped out!

Here are two belly pics. Ask and ye shall receive, LOL! These are taken in mat skirts. Unlike the previous photos, I am not pulling my shirt taut. That's just "as is." The baby belly is growing! :-)

I know some people love to go shopping. I am not one of them although I don't dislike it like Paul (with the exception of books - he could spend hours in Borders or B&N). We have lived in this area for almost 4 years, and this was my 2nd time at the mall I went to today. This mall is 45 minutes away from our home. I did make a quick stop into Motherhood (didn't buy anything or try anything on), but other than that I just shopped in Macy's. The clearance selection wasn't as great as at the other mall (especially in the children's dept). Anyhow today I spent $47.35 on 10 items (3 for my sisters, 1 for me, and 6 for a niece). Yesterday we were using a 20% coupon Cheri had on top of the other discounts, so if I had that today the total would have been $37.88. The total for the original prices of today's items was $247. They also removed the security tag from the one item I bought yesterday. I have no desire to go to another shopping mall any time soon, LOL. I got quite a bit of bday and Christmas shopping done though, and after I lose the baby weight I have a few new outfits for myself also. If I had to do it over again, I would have bought more yesterday. I am kicking myself for not buying more of the snowmen sweater vests! The vest is sooo cute and only cost $2.39. Why did I only buy one of them? I wouldn't mind having one myself for example! The original price was $60 so I thought it was going to be $12 (most of the items were 75% off and then we had the 20% off coupon on top of that), but for whatever reason it was only $2.39. I don't want that vest enough to drive all the way back there. We were smart with the one skirt for my mom that also came up as $2.39 (that was originally $89). We went and got two more of them (one for Cheri and one for me). My best bargain today was a shirt that was originally $28 that I got for $3.49. I bought two of them (one for each sister). I have never been this far ahead with Christmas shopping before. It's only March 2 for Pete's sake, LOL!

Today I found out that the situation which had me VERY upset on Monday has been resolved favorably! HUGE sigh of relief on my part!!! It had to do with an article that had been accepted in December and then I was told on Monday it was being rejected (for what I considered a ridiculous reason). Well today I was told it's being published this spring after all. Whew... She apologized for the "idiosyncrocy." That's not the word I would use, but the bottom line is that all is well. Since I had another article accepted on Monday, I am now up to 6 refereed articles in 3 years! This is very, very good news as in higher education it's a case of "publish or perish."

In conclusion I have to say one more time that choir robes were not created with pg women in mind. I thought I was going to die up there in the choir loft, and I purposefully wore a short sleeve sweater (even though there is snow on the ground). I might not be able to sing in the choir all the way until May. It's just TOO hot up there with the spotlights and a choir robe on.