Getting Closer, and "Fun Problems"

Even though I know I'm just 3 weeks and a day from my "guess date," seeing the BabyTicker say "22 days" is really a trip!

I'm feeling very, very grateful to not be working now. I was so worried about being bored, and maybe I will get there yet, but I'm staring to doubt it. In any case, despite good progress on my ToodleDo to do list, I'm not there yet! If I ever finish that (hah!), maybe I can experience boredom.

Yesterday was a [too] busy day. I went to a local new-and-expectant moms group in nearby Ditmas Park (it's a neighborhood, not a park) for a meet-up in the backyard of a local coffeeshop. There must've been at least ten new moms there, plus three of us pregnant ladies. It was a little overwhelming, all the strollers, plus being sandwiched between two brand new moms nursing tiny babies, and not wanting to disturb anyone when my pregnant bladder called for relief.

It's also a little weird for me because of my profession. I don't really advertise (offline, anyway) that I am a pediatric nurse practitioner, and even if I did, I'm not 100% sure that people connect that to being very much like a pediatrician. And I think it's really important for new mamas to get their sea legs under them, so to speak, and not hear from me, some sort of professional, pronouncing "God's own truth." And then there's the fact that I haven't worked with babies since my training, which ended five years ago, so I'm not actually an expert on all things baby at this point. Still, I have a pretty solid foundation... especially when you add in the fact that I've been doing the online coursework to become a lactation consultant... though there's still HUGE holes in my knowledge there.

So I stay silent a lot, especially since I don't have a baby yet (on the outside) to offer me an opening into the conversation. Which left me feeling a little bored in the beginning. Later on, when the group size shrank and was a little more mixed (two pregnants, one newborn, two older infants), I felt like I had more to contribute and had a better time. But I'm curious -- will newborn talk be more fascinating to me when I am in the throes of newborn-hood? Certainly I am all about cataloging late pregnancy woes and tricks these days!

Anyway, after the group, I walked with former summer camp friend/SMC friend Emily over to her apartment, just two blocks from mine, with her three year old daughter. She moves in next week! I helped her figure out where she wants to put furniture... mainly by making suggestions which helped her realize where she didn't want things. But I stayed longer than I meant to, and my feet were tired by the end.

Shortly after I got home, my SMC friend Catherine (now 41 weeks 4 days, and no sign of labor yet, poor thing!) came by to bring me a book. She was willing to chat with me while I lay on the couch with my feet up, so that was nice. And right after she left, I mixed up a smoothie (yay for my new blender! after having a bad experience spraying blended blueberry all over my shirt, pants, and cabinets, I finally threw in the towel on using the hand blender with frozen fruit) and then my friend Stephen picked me up to take me to Ikea. He and his wife had given me an Ikea gift card for a shower gift, with the assumption that I would get a ride over there to boot (since he's given me rides there before).

I bought two new dressers, since I've been having "fancy dresser" envy ever since I got one for Lentil -- hers is so much nicer than what I've been using. So I upgraded from the $69 Ikea dresser to the $150 Ikea dresser. See what comes with dreaming big!

After the Ikea trip, I still had to listen to my Hypnobabies CD. (Aside: I don't know that I'm getting to a good place with Hypnobabies. I feel like it's starting to bug me.) I am supposed to practice entering hypnosis five times a day, plus listen to one 30 minute recording per day. I'm doing well with the daily listening sessions, but I'm lucky to do one additional entering-hypnosis-practice session. Last night I had to keep wriggling my legs, and just couldn't stay still during my listening session. (Hey, does anyone know the difference between wiggling and wriggling? I sure don't.) So I'm not sure what to think or do about my feelings towards Hypnobabies. Maybe my fabulous doula, Chloe, will have some suggestions. I do think that doing my listening earlier in the day seems to help a bit.

Today I woke up with a marked sense of lethargy and pronounced heaviness in my legs. It's interesting to watch my endurance levels decline! I meant to work out, since I achieved my goal of five days in a week (at 20 minutes each) on the elliptical as of Wednesday, but nope, way too tired.  So far I've accomplished almost nothing, except for ordering Medela replacement tubing for the breast pump today. My apartment is looking increasingly cluttered, all the more so now with Ikea boxes leaning up against the furniture in my front hall. But so far, I haven't mustered up the energy to create an ever larger mess by unpacking the boxes and assembling the dressers.

Last night, after again not finding a rug I loved at Ikea, I finally, successfully, found and ordered a rug I like from HomeDepot.com last night. For only $147. Hopefully this will appease the sound-sensitive aka persnickety downstairs neighbor. The next step is to measure my bedroom, and figure out how much of my furniture needs to come out in order to lay down the rug.

Do y'all think, for maximum sound reduction purposes, that the rug should go under the crib? The rug I ordered is 8 x 10 feet, and my bedroom is roughly 12 x 16.5.  I figure it doesn't need to go under my bed, or under the dressers.

I am not looking forward to having both outgoing and incoming dressers set up in my hallway for a few days while I wait for my new rug to arrive.

I do not do well with clutter. Too bad my apartment seems to be increasingly cluttered these days, with only more possessions due to arrive, namely the [enormous] jogging stroller, plus the crib (currently residing in the closet in its folded up form), and then the rug and incoming and outgoing dressers, of course. I'd also like to replace my futon frame (topped with nearly brand new hand-me-down Tempurpedic mattress which I am most assuredly not getting rid of) with an actual bed frame, albeit a cheap platform bed, so that my pillows stop ending up on the hard wooden "arm rest" of the futon, but that would mean having to figure out what to do with the futon frame, namely, how to get rid of it. That may be too much for my pea sized brain and energy capacity.

And finally, does anyone else find that pregnancy has made them an incredibly boring conversationalist (and blogger)? I seem to have almost nothing to add to conversations these days.

Thanks to all for the photo feedback!

Update: the floor was measured, and I know now where the rug will go -- under the crib and under one end of my bed. One dresser was assembled, taking an ungodly amount of time. I'm pretty sure that lugging around and assembling furniture was not on the list of "Things Your Midwife Recommends You Do Without Help In the Final Weeks of Pregnancy," but at least it's done. And with it, I earned some well-deserved satisfaction, especially since there were a couple of times I thought I would have to throw in the towel and get help. And it looks great! No more Mama-has-fancy-dresser-envy for me!

I posted a listing for the two used dressers on the local parents' listserve. Selling each for $20... but if that doesn't work, there's always Freecycle dot com.

And I took the "before" photos to post... once I get to the "after" phase. Let's hope it's soon!

Oh, and the jogging stroller arrived this afternoon, and is taking up lots (and lots) of real estate in the hallway. <Sigh> This better mean that running (jogging) will be taking place soon!