Nesting April 29, 2009

Last week was my first week of no work, and it has been great so far.  I am getting stuff done and still having time to relax and go to the gym (or not…) and see my friends.  It is definitely a luxury that I am grateful for that I am able to do this for a month (plus or minus) until the baby arrives.

This week I am definitely nesting – purging clutter, cleaning and organizing kitchen cabinets, cleaning out the linen closet, etc.  It feels good to have everything in order before the baby comes and creates all kinds of disorder. 

We went to a cloth diapering class last weekend.  I was fairly well decided that I want to try it, but Mike was on the fence at best.  He is all about easy, and was not excited about the extra work of cloth diapering.  But after he saw that besides the extra laundry (which will be mostly my responsibility since I will be home either full time or part time) it really isn’t much harder, he is totally on board with it.  So I need to go out sometime this week or next and get stocked up on our cloth diapering supplies. 

I am still feeling really good.  I am not uncomfortable except for those occasional times when my feet and ankles get swollen – I don’t like that feeling.  But fortunately 15 minutes in the pool seems to cure that pretty easily.  Hopefully these next couple of weeks I’ll stay feeling good.  I don’t have any stretch marks yet either (knock on wood) – maybe I got good genetics there.  I’ve gained at least 35 pounds already, so I’ll be a little over the recommended 25 to 35 pounds.  I am somewhat concerned about being able to lose the weight, but hopefully with breastfeeding and lots of walks on the lakefront I’ll do okay.  My one real complaint right now is that I am not really sleeping much.  I’ve been taking naps most days, but I can’t seem to stay asleep at night.  I don’t know if it is him moving, or if I just can’t sleep – I am not feeling uncomfortable at night, I just can’t stay asleep and then when I wake up I am up for an hour or so. 

We had a big scare on Monday night after our last childbirth class.  It was dark outside and raining and we had to cross the street to get to the car and like idiots we decided to cross halfway, wait, and cross the other half when the coast cleared (not at a light).  But we learned our lesson about not doing stupid things like that.  I started to cross the second half, then hesitated because it didn’t look like Mike was going, then he told me not to stop, so I ran as fast as I could since there were cars coming and I needed to get out of the way.  Apparently my legs don’t move as fast as they used to, because after I was most of the way across I started to fall forward because I couldn’t keep up with the momentum.  I feel on my knees and an elbow – thank God I didn’t fall flat on my belly.  After my fall I didn’t feel the baby move for about half an hour – when he had been moving the whole night up until then.  I was so scared that I had done something horrible to him and just as I was thinking that I didn’t know how I could possibly go on with my life if I had killed the baby with my idiotic fall, I felt him move again.  He’s been moving ever since, so I think everything is fine, but I was so scared for a while.  I have one very scraped and bruised knee, but if that is the worst that happened (I keep visualizing one of the two of us getting hit by one of those cars – oh my God it could have been so much worse!) then we were very lucky.

Last weekend we got the armoire moved into the baby’s room and the clothes unpacked into it.  This weekend Mike is planning on putting all the air conditioners in the windows so that we can tuck the treadmill away in the back storage area and then we can get the rest of the nursery stuff put away.  The glider chair arrived this morning, so now everything is here.  It will be so fun to get everything arranged and pictures on the walls and have that room totally ready for him to come home.   I was feeling a little superstitious when we were putting stuff together last weekend and taking things out of boxes.  If something horrible happens, we can’t return anything anymore… But I have to think positively.  It’s kind of hard to trust still, even 2 weeks from my due date, that everything is going to be fine after what we went through to even get to be pregnant. 

As usual my mom is driving me nuts.   She wants us to call her the moment I go into labor so she can get here as soon as possible.  I keep telling her that I might be in labor for 36 hours – who knows – this stuff is impossible to predict!  And I don’t really want her driving here at 3 in the morning either if it happens in the middle of the night.  But she wants to know as soon as anything happens.  I made no promises when I talked to her yesterday – just told her we would keep her informed.  I am really not excited about having her and my in-laws sitting at the hospital waiting for the baby to be born.  It feels like pressure to me, even if that isn’t what they intend.  In fact, in an ideal world, I wish they would not be there waiting and we could call them after the baby is born and tell them to come in 5 or 6 hours – after I have been able to nurse the baby and then we all sleep for a little while before having visitors.  But this is a battle I am losing on all fronts – with my mom, Mike’s mom, and Mike too.  My mom, as usual, just seems to not care one bit what I want – just what she wants.  It is so aggrivating.  I don’t know how to change this dynamic which really needs to be changed for my own sanity over the next years with this child.  Ugh.

Off to the linen closet now to continue my nesting and get rid of all the clutter and unnecessary stuff back there.

T-minus 5 weeks April 10, 2009

Ever since I hit the second trimester, and then the holidays, the time has been flying by.  I am now counting down – five weeks from today is my due date.  As a major pre-planner, I am feeling woefully unprepared.  I don’t own diapers, a car seat, or lots of other things that will be necessary and/or helpful when the baby arrives.  But, a mini-shower tomorrow with Mike’s family in from Michigan and a real shower next weekend should remedy some of that, and then I can go buy whatever else we are going to need. 

We own all the nursery furniture that we need, but the crib hasn’t been put together, the armoire is in the dining room (as it is going to require taking the nursery door off the hinges to get it into the bedroom), the chair hasn’t arrived, and my mom is bringing the changing table next weekend.  So, right now that room is still just a total disaster area with the hand-me-down baby stuff scattered all around. 

Next week is my last week of work too.  I am cooking just one day next week and also finishing up the grantwriting project that I have been working on (due Thursday), so by Friday of next week, which also marks 36 weeks, I’ll be totally done working and I’ll be able to focus on getting stuff around here done.  I already have a to-do list that takes up an entire sheet of paper.  (Those who know me IRL would not be surprised by this!)  Hopefully the baby won’t come early and I’ll have time to get to all of it.  The nursery furniture situation probably won’t be remedied until the weekend of the 25/26, which is a little close for comfort for me, but with my parents coming in for the shower next weekend, that’s just the way it is going to have to be. 

Despite these rather minor stresses, we are just getting more and more excited.  I met four new babies this week, which helped with the excitement – 3-week-old twin boys, an 8 month-old that I hadn’t met yet, and a 2-week-old baby girl.  So fun.

A few people know the baby’s (probable) name, but we aren’t telling many people.  I did tell the nurses at the RE’s office and one friend in Maine. Everyone else will have to wait until May to find out.

We’re still debating cloth diapers – Mike is still pretty hesitant and I am a little hesitant – and are going to a cloth diapering class in a couple weeks to see what we can learn about it and whether we really want to take the plunge.  In the meantime I have registered for a few different types of diapers, so we’ll see if some nice family and friends will buy them for us so we can try them out.  We are finding out that more and more of our friends are using them and really love them.  In fact, all four of the new babies I met this week are diapered this way. 

Baby Ito has been moving around a lot the last couple of weeks, except for a couple hours this morning when I didn’t feel him at all – I drank some chocolate milk and laid down to see if I could feel him moving, and sure enough he did after a few minutes and has been moving ever since.  But I was a little nervous when I hadn’t felt him…I am still afraid that this miracle is going to be taken away from me.

But overall, all is well and I am both really excited for the birth to get here, and still nervous about the whole birth process.  I just can’t wait to see him!