Pregnant pics

This is me, today, at 31 weeks:
Now before all of you start composing stinging comments on how I've been frauding you about how big I am, please watch what happens in profile:

Isn't that a big bump? With 9 weeks left to go? I'm already almost at the weight I had reached with Moppet at full-term. I was looking for a picture of me pregnant with Moppet at the same stage and I found this one:


See what I mean? I think this might have been around 28 weeks or so, and maybe the denim overalls make the bump look smaller than it is, but still...

Funny story about that maternity dress - one of my biggest cribs when I was pregnant with Moppet was the unavailability of decent maternity wear in Bombay. Pants and capris came in the most horrendous colours and materials and the tops were either in ghastly prints or in cutesie colours with teddy bears and silly messages on them. And as for skirts and dresses, ha, forget it! (Quite a contrast to Bangkok, where the range of maternity wear is absolutely stunning. I've even seen maternity hot pants and mini-skirts!)

But coming back to the story of the dress - I had mentioned casually to my dad how I really wanted denim overalls, but couldn't find any in Bombay. His next overseas trip happened to be to Prague, and sweet man that he is, decided to spend his spare time finding denim maternity overalls for me.

Finding a store was hard enough, but that was the least of his difficulties. The salesperson spoke no English, and my dad didn't know a word of Czech. After several minutes of charades, he managed to explain what he was looking for, and was shown a few suitable options.

Then came the biggest hurdle yet - what would be the right size? He looked around the store and saw no one - customers or salespeople - who could function as a proxy for me. The only one who came close to my size was...himself.

So what does he do? He tries it on, causing much consternation among the sales people. Heaven knows what they thought of this lone middle-aged man, trying on maternity clothes!

Anyway he found a size that fit, and brought it back for me, much to my delight - the dress is wonderful, but its story makes it even more precious to me. I love what he was willing to do for me, despite the cost to his dignity. I love even more that he is cool enough share the story. He could so easily have just given me the dress and not told me that he actually had to try it on himself :-)

After Moppet was born, I gave away all my maternity clothes, except the denim overalls, of course. I haven't worn them much this time around because they're heavy denim and it's way too hot here, but that's one item in my wardrobe that I know I'm not going to give away. Ever.