New Year, New Belly Button

The New Year has gotten off to a bang and a fizzle, although not everything went according to plan. The fizzle was me laid up on the couch for all of New Years Day. No hang over, but there are just some things in pregnancy that can strike and make you uber uncomfortable, but they are better not discussed in polite company. The fun part was that for New Years Eve (our last ever sans kiddos! gulp!) we decided to host a nice little dinner party. Our dear friends the Ferrales couldn't join us at the last minute because Gabrielle caught a stomach virus from her toddler, and we were all sad to miss them. We still had five couples who made the trek out through the freezing Chicago weather to join us.



Over Christmas I found this fantastic dress at the limited and was uber excited that it not only fit me while pregnant, but it sort of looked like it was supposed to work on a pregnant belly. A new red cocktail dress was all the incentive I needed to get a little dressed up for the occasion, complete with some fun and festive hair feathers that we found downtown at H&M.





Once I'd decided to go fancy, there was no holding me back. I got to set our table with our fancy wedding china and crystal champagne flutes. Woohoo! And it seemed appropriate to celebrate with the breakables since kiddos on the horizon make that all the more difficult. And I was totally pleased with how gorgeous the table looked all decked out.





I wimped out on making the planned salmon neopolitans for lack of time and energy, but we still put together a fabulous trio of pasta sauces (Batali's lemon jalapeno, alla vodka sauce, and sausage Ragu) to serve on top of some fantastic homemade fettuchini that Terry prepared. Friends brought appetizers and dessert.



We played some games, briefly had a conga line going, and then celebrated the countdown with a big bottle of champagne (nonalcoholic white grape juice for me).





And well, as for the new belly button, sometime on New Years Day Terry looked at my belly and said sweetly "Look, you still have a little belly button." To which I replied, "What?! Where did my belly button go?" And to my shock discovered and my growing belly has pretty much pushed my little belly button from normal and concave to just about flat. I suppose the next step is that pregnancy outie belly button.