Any day now...

Baby’s due date came and went uneventfully yesterday. Part of me really held out hope that she would come precisely on time, but as Matt reminded me, she is also his daughter so will likely run a little late.

I’ve been having pretty bizzare dreams since the one about the bird the other night. The next night I dreamt that Madeye Moody (the creepy looking one from the Harry Potter movies) would be delivering my baby. He gave me 5.5 hours until I HAD to have the baby and I wasn’t even in labor yet. Talk about a little anxiety. Last night I dreamt that I was sitting in Mom’s front hall circa 1990s with the orange carpet on the stairs and the 70s tile and trying to explain to Barak Obama and Oprah Winfrey why we were calling the baby Oprah for now. They seemed highly offended and I was making a lot of excuses and trying to smooth things over. I can’t wait to see what my crazy mind comes up with tonight.

My other favorite recent pass time is to watch people’s horror when I tell them when I’m due. It always starts nicely. I’m in with a patient and family, or at the store, or yesterday at the mechanics and to be polite someone asks when I’m due. Last week I watched people wince when I said “4 days” etc. They would get an alarmed look as if I may squat and deliver right then and there and keep looking at me nervously throught the visit. Yesterday at the mechanics, when the guy behind the counter asked and I said “today,” he got really flustered and kept hitting the send button to try to get the credit card to process faster. Man he looked like he might start to cry as he fumbled and said “oh, we’ve just got to get you out of here!” I can’t wait to see how much more panicked people get as I get further and further on the other side of the due date.

Matt and his family have decided they’re starting a poll to see when I’ll deliver. The prize is a dessert of the winner’s choice. Dean picked Friday as it is his birthday and Jan, Laura and Matt picked dates with the latest one as next Tuesday. I picked tomorrow because I want it to be tomorrow, not necessarily because I think that it will be tomorrow. Anyone else who wants to get in on this poll is welcome and we’ll work out the details of awarding prizes after she comes. We haven’t started guessing weight yet either, but if anyone wants to hazard a guess that’s ok too.

Duncan and Oscar are enjoying us being around the house and getting lots of attention. I’m not sure if this will make it harder when the baby comes, but it’s fun to spoil them for now. Oscar is in the middle of his spring shedding and leaves football sized wads of hair around the house daily and we’ve dubbed these Oscar’s “hair babies.” Duncan makes up for Oscar’s abundance of hair by remaining nearly bald in patches and itching himself raw. Last spring his allergies resolved, I’m not sure what the difference is this spring. Who knows.

I think that Matt and I are heading out to dinner now. We keep telling each other that this may be the last time we go out for dinner for a while so we keep treating ourselves to meals out. At some point this is going to get really spendy, but it’s hard to argue with the logic at the moment. I also keep grocery shopping, but am not buying for any real meals because I keep thinking that they will go to waste. Oh well, at some point it will end…

Here I am today. Not the greatest picture as Matt wasn't around to play cameraman, but you get the idea.

39+6

It looks like baby will not be joining us before her due date, unless she has some quick plans for the next 3.5 hours. This is all fine and good as long as she doesn't procrastinate too much longer. I know that physically I'd be OK for another 2 weeks, but if she waits that long, Matt will be back at work in the MICU and that will be a huge bummer.

I had some periods of being really productive this weekend. I finally washed the kitchen floor (I can only imagine how silly that looked) finished packing things for the hospital, and enjoyed some quality time with Matt. Today I was pooped, so Matt resumed nesting by cleaning out the porch and sorting through closets in the basement. It's amazing to see the things that we've squirreled away over the years. Come to find out we have about 20 beige light switch and outlet plates left over from all of our painting projects. Anyone interested?

I've decided that tomorrow would be a good day for baby to come. Prior to today, I'd decided that last Saturday and today would be ideal as those were the only days this week that my midwife is at the hospital. Since we missed that, tomorrow would be OK with me. The house is clean, Matt took the dogs to the park today and they're all tired and I've run out of ways to spend my time. Yup, tomorrow would be fine.

Since the last post had no pictures, I'll include some this time. Here is the rabbit bunker in the back yard and the new quilt that I'm working on. I'm happier with the bunker than I thought that I would be and not as happy with the quilt as I thought I would be. Oh well.

Wish me luck in getting this kiddo out. I had a dream last night that I found out that she was a bird with a very sharp looking beak... yikes, I hope that's one dream doesn't come true!

39 weeks

So today I am 39+2. Actually that's baby's age not mine, I'm still holding on tight to 29 for a few more weeks. This week has been ok. I'm working half days and tomorrow is my last day of work. The waiting has become much tougher and I'm feeling even more restless and distracted with each passing day. The days are also going by very slowly. I feel like I need something to occupy my time, but have trouble getting myself interested in doing much of anything that would actually distract me. Physically I'm still doing pretty well. With some more rest over the last week, my blood pressure was great at my appointment today and I'd managed to drop some of the fluid weight. She also informed me that I'm 1.5 cm dilated and 70% effaced and that the baby is engaged (0 station). Initially this made me really happy and excited, but now I'm thinking that this may make waiting even harder because I feel like things should be happening. I guess waiting is hard regardless and I'll just try to relax and let go since I can't control this at all. That's really about it from here, we're headed out to dinner with some friends. Matt decided that he wanted a Juicy Lucy burger (burger with melted cheese inside the meat) and fries and I have to say that the salty food sounds great right now. Bring on the fluid retention!!

On again, off again

I had my appointment with the midwife yesterday. I've been feeling pretty good lately with no big complaints, but I had noticed over the last few days that my legs are a lot more swollen and my hands are a little puffy too. Last week they commented that my blood pressure was a little up. Certainly not in a range that would be high blood pressure to anyone else, but I am a Lee girl. So this week not only was my BP still up (118/75) but I also managed to gain 5lbs in a week. Hmm.. not too good. I'm sure that it is all fluid, but it's still alarming considering I haven't gained anything in the last 4 weeks and I figured that maybe I was done getting heavier. We're just keeping an eye on everything for now, but she did nix my new walking program and took me back to working half days. I feel at this point like I'm the on again, off again resident and it's getting hard. I know that taking time off has been the right thing to do for me each time I've done it, but I've only managed to work 6 weeks since the beginning of the year! I think that baby just needs to come so I don't feeling like a slacker sitting at home feeling perfectly fine.

I also tried to post pictures of the nursery yesterday, but the computer wouldn't have it, so here they are today.

38 weeks

Not much news to report from here. We're still waiting for baby and I'm starting to get the feeling like this could be awhile. Being back at work has taken my mind off things a bit, but I'm still finding it really hard to get much done. My new rotation is in the international adoption clinic. It's a great rotation and not just because it's not too taxing and the hours are excellent. I spend most days reviewing documents from children that families are interested in adopting and trying to get an idea about the health of the child and the risk of medical, developmental and psychological problems if the child were adopted. It's a lot like putting together a puzzle with a lot of missing pieces, but I really enjoy it. We also spend time in the clinic seeing the kids after they arrive here. We work with psychologists, occupational, speech and physical therapy. All in all it's a lot of fun, but I'm still wishing for baby.

The weather around here took a turn for the better last weekend. After our snow on Friday, things really got a lot nicer and I've been able to walk to and from work every day. I'm sure that this is great for my health, but I'm not sure that it's been very effective in getting the baby to drop. I'm still getting kicked up by my ribs. It also makes me really tired and Matt's been tucking me into bed most nights by 8:30. What a life.

It was so nice yesterday that Matt took both dogs to the small dog park near the house. He said that they'd laid down new bark chips around and the boys had tons of fun playing fetch. Oscar, however, is not used to the warm yet and found the one and only mud puddle in the park in which to cool off. Matt said the puddle was at least a foot deep of thick mud. Oscar and Duncan both decided that it would be great to submerge their entire bodies in the mud. Needless to say they got their first baths of the season when they got home.

I'm off to the midwife today for another check up. Last week the midwife told me that we might be having a May baby after all because the baby and I don't seem to be making much progress towards labor. I'm hoping that maybe this week she'll change her tune again. I know that she can't really predict any of these things, but I look forward to hearing them anyway. Silly me. Luckily I'm still feeling really good and my peds preceptor told me that I didn't look nearly awful and uncomfortable enough for the baby to be coming any time soon. Here's a picture of me from today at 38 +2. It's amazing to think about just how big baby is getting.

We're also pretty much done with the nursery. There are still a few things that need to be hung on the walls, but otherwise I think that we're set. We even got the diapers delivered last week and Matt has the car seat base installed in the civic. I'm hoping that my frantic nesting period is over and I don't have to move on to scrubbing the windows and reorganizing the cupboards.

Matt's nesting has taken place in the yard. As soon as the weather warmed up, Matt was outside waging war against the rabbits. Apparently the last few mild winters have left us with tons of rabbits and they enjoyed eating the bark off of our plum tree and munching on our blueberries all winter. The blueberries should rebound, but I'm afraid that the plum tree may not. Matt has been working what he calls "the bunker" in the backyard to protect the blueberries and the veggie beds. Luckily it is not quite as obtrusive as the name suggests and it will keep Matt from taking up rabbit hunting.

37 Weeks

As we keep waiting patiently for the real start of spring, baby preparations have really picked up. We've got the nursery pretty well put together now. Baby clothes are washed, hospital bags (almost) packed.

Shirley, Katie, and Laura threw Fran a baby shower last week. They had a great time, and we received many generous gifts. The most unexpected gift came from Katie and Jon-- looks like our baby will be heading to med school after all!

On a more somber note, I turned 30 years old last week. I still maintain your thirties don't start until age 31. In any case, I'll be in good company when Fran hits that milestone in mid-May. Fran got me a small camcorder for my birthday, we're looking forward to many happy memories recorded with our baby. As baby gets older, maybe we'll even capture a classic like "football in the groin", a father could only be so lucky.

Fran is 37 weeks today and is doing great. She is really a champ and I'm very proud of her. Checkups have been only good news. Baby has been really active lately. The big unknown for us now is when we'll get to meet her (and finally pick a name)!