Still here!

Look who's ready to be changed!

I had an appt with the dr yesterday and will have another tomorrow. To sum up: Izaak is still not ready to come out on his own!! Tomorrow's appt will determine if/when the induction date will be set for, probably some time next week. I was hooked up to a monitor for awhile at the appt yesterday to determine if I'm having any contractions (which I correctly had told them I wasn't) and to see how the baby's heartbeat is doing over a longer period of time - fine and dandy. My dr's advice yesterday was to enjoy the rest of the day and she suggested I hit up the outlet mall. Far be it from me to want to disobey the dr's orders so I met up with my friend, Lori, for lunch and meandering around. It was quite hot and I was a sweaty mess but I had a lovely time regardless!

Trying to sleep last night was another matter entirely. I couldn't get comfortable, I was too warm, and Joe was snoring (which he either doesn't do very often or I'm usually asleep before the log-sawing begins). I tried sleeping on the futon with a fan aimed at me but it was noisy and I'd only get about 30 mins of sleep at a time before waking up uncomfortable and irritated, half the time because I needed to get up to use the bathroom, yet again. Did I drink 5 gallons of water before bedtime? Not that I recall! I finally was able to sleep for a few solid hours after I crawled back in bed after Joe got up to go to work. Hopefully, Izaak was uncomfortable too and will want to leave his cozy surroundings soon!

HUGE and still going to the
neighborhood pool.... so there!

Today, I've been working on cleaning up clutter and doing laundry. This pre-baby "extra time" is probably a blessing in disguise. Sure I'm uncomfortable and can't move very fast but I'm getting a mini-vacation out of the deal, I get to enjoy some quiet me-time (even though it is filled with cleaning and other such mundane tasks!!) and I think it's about time to head to the swimming pool again!

Due Date?!

So, today is Izaak's actual due date. And he's still in no hurry to leave the cozy surroundings he's used to. I've tried spicy food, walks, got a pedicure, etc but to no avail. I'm trying not to stress about it as that seems a bit counterproductive at this point. He'll arrive when he's ready (or when my doctor decides it's medically relevant to bring on his delivery).

Today is my first official day off of work! It's 8am and I've already been up for a little while, doing some light cleaning, house straightening, and some research on breastfeeding. I intend to head to the pool for awhile this morning to enjoy my buoyancy and some sun. Later on, I plan to log in some quality couch hours, just resting up. I don't want to spend much time sitting in front of the computer - especially since that's a big reason why I'm not at work today!! By the way, my ankle bones - though not prominent - are currently visible!

Anyhow, I promise we'll keep everyone informed as to when we go to the hospital and things start making progress. And trust that nobody is more anxious than me to have this baby out of my belly and into our arms!

Dr Visit #83 (or so)

My doctor didn't have good news for me. She didn't have bad news exactly, baby is doing fine and I'm ok, but baby is content where he is and seemingly has no plans to make his grand debut quite yet. (Meaning: no signs of dilation yet, thus making me feel like a failure... come on self, get this birthing thing figured out already!!). I'm still planning for Friday to be my last day of work. My next appt is Tuesday morning. Maybe Izaak and I will have stuff figured out by then. The doctor mentioned again that she didn't want me to go past 41 weeks but my cervix needs to start making some progress before she can really push things along for a natural birth. Awesome. And she estimates that he's at least 8lbs already. Any day now, kiddo! I've heard from a number of people that first-born boys tend to be on the later side. I guess it's comforting that I'm not the only preggo with a baby who's taking his sweet time!!

I got a package in the mail from my sister today, it contained a pretty sterling and green-blue glass beaded bracelet for me and an adorable hand-made knitted and stuffed creature for Izaak - his first stuffed animal! I think it's name will be "Creature" or "Thing" or "Sam"... I can't decide. Oh, I think I decided on a name for the new car too, "Clive Carwen".

I'm still plagued by weird dreams. Here's what I remember of my dream from last night (warning, it rambles and doesn't make any sense): I was shopping at Nordstrom’s for a new purse and scarf but I couldn’t afford anything and as I wandered, it kind of morphed into a Target store and now I wanted to buy something for Izaak (specifically, Box #26… no idea what that means, but there was some cool stuff in it) and I couldn’t find a box that hadn’t already been opened – thus missing cool stuff - and somehow ended up shopping for skate/BMX shoes at some other store with a couple guys for about 5 minutes but there was a whole wall of shoes that were missing and then I was wandering through a fancy-schmancy restaurant where they were serving up swan… it was still alive and changed colors, its feet were stuck in Jello so it couldn’t go anywhere. I wasn’t sure if the people were actually going to eat the swan, I think I reasoned it out that it was just a decoration. And at some point, one of my friends was a cat and I gave her a blanket... Is it really any wonder why I wake up disoriented and exhausted??

Joe is grouting the tile in the kitchen right now. We're so close to having our kitchen back, I'm so excited! And hungry. Time to go forage the fridge (still in the living room) for dinner.

Just a Quickie...

This is the life! 

We are enjoying the calm before the storm presently. Joe finished laying the tile in the kitchen(!!!), he'll be adding the grout tomorrow and replacing the trim and getting the appliances back to their respective "homes" hopefully by this weekend as well. As fun as it's been having the refrigerator in the living room, I'm very ready to have the kitchen put back together! I have another doctor's appointment tomorrow, fingers crossed that she'll tell me that Izaak is well on his way. As mentioned in a previous post, since Monday is my due date, I decided that Friday is my last day of work... and it can't come fast enough. Sitting in front of the computer, pretending to be content and comfortable is getting more and more challenging. My idiot tolerance level is close to zero and my brain isn't at its sharpest right now either so sometimes I'm the idiot... no fun! Plus, I think I'm making some people at work nervous, as if they feel that the baby is just going to fall out at some point and they're going to have to deal with it or something. Silly! Anyhow, I'm exhausted (no surprise there!) so it's time to turn in for the evening. Good night :)

Another Day, Another Dollar.

To sum up today: Tired! Had no interest in vertical mobility when I woke (which really isn't that unusual I suppose!) and have had a heck of a time staying conscious during work.

I did end up getting in to see the doctor yesterday. I called in the morning and explained that I got the time messed up so they gave me an appt in the middle of the day (for punishment I think!). Usually, I go after work so I don't have to go back to work after the appt and make up the hours I've missed. Anyhow, my blood pressure is normal and the baby's heartrate is fine, but my legs/feet/ankles/etc are really swollen and uncomfortable. The doctor offered to write a letter to have me stop working now, before baby's arrival. She said she normally doesn't have a lot of sympathy for most pregnancy symptoms but she can tell how uncomfortable I am and sitting at the computer is exacerbating the problem. I explained that I need to work the next couple of weeks, if possible, in order to be able to spend more time with the baby when I'm able to hold him in my arms - rather than in my belly. Plus, I figure that I can either be miserable at home for free or get paid to be miserable at work!! Without being too graphic, let's just say that she determined that Baby Izaak isn't quite ready to come out either. Things of course could change at any moment, but so far he's seemingly happy where he is. I asked how long past my due date she'd let him go (if he decides to hang out that long) and she said that she doesn't typically let anyone go much past 41 weeks... so, he will be a June-baby, regardless! Doctor also commented that my roundness is "all baby" but I think maybe she was just trying to be nice. She did mention that if I sat in the waiting room for very long that I'd see some really, REALLY big bellies.

I discussed with my boss about having time off today. I explained that I'm due on the 13th (Monday after next) but plan on having my last day being the 10th (Friday before the due date) if the baby hasn't shown up sooner. Six weeks of maternity leave takes me through Friday, July 22nd (my birthday!) but I'm considering taking an additional 4 weeks off, without pay, which will put me back to work on Monday, August 15th (Joe's birthday!). I will have the option to work less hours, so perhaps I'll do a Wednesday through Friday schedule or something for awhile when I do return. Maybe I won't take the extra 4 weeks... eh, we'll see when I get there!!! I'm sure I'll appreciate having some structured adult time at work after being at home for a month and a half.... or not :)

It's Official, I'm an Idiot.

In preparation for my doctor's appt today, I intended on leaving at 3pm from work. I noticed that I was still at work at 3:15. No big deal, I was just trying to get home a little early prior to the appointment. Joe was home when I got there because he stayed home with a migraine today so I spent some time chatting with him then finally got around to taking a quick shower. While in the bathroom, I noticed the toilet was kind of dirty so I spent a couple minutes cleaning it up. I knew it was getting close to the appointment time, but typically, I'm waiting for an hour past my scheduled time so I figured being a few minutes late wouldn't be a big deal. My brain remembered my appt being at 4:45, yet when I showed up at the doctor's office about 10 minutes late, the lights were out and the door was already locked. Sweet. So, I guess maybe my appointment was at 4:30? I misplaced the appointment card when cleaning out the car we traded in and had forgotten to put the info in my phone this time around. I tried calling right away because I thought that I had seen one of the front desk girls inside still but it went straight to their after-hours answering service. So now, I've got to call in the morning, apologize profusely, and hope that they can get me in to see the dr in the next couple of days and I'll probably have to take off from work to get in as well. Boo!

Vroom!

Hooray for three-day weekends! I feel it's safe to say that our Memorial Day weekend was somewhat eventful. Started off on Friday after work by purchasing a Graco baby swing from Craigslist. I still check through the baby stuff on Craigslist here and there even thought there isn't a particular item that I have in mind anymore. Mostly just "maybe could be nice" items remain at this point, since we've got the big stuff covered. This particular listing had "Owl" in the title and I was nicely surprised to find that it goes with the Pack 'n Play, stroller and carseat that we already had. The swing itself isn't discontinued but the owl pattern is so I didn't even know that such a thing existed until I saw the ad posting. It barely fit in my car after half disassembling it so the next stop was the car dealership that we'd been to 5 times already. Ok, maybe we'd already been planning to hit up the car dealership too. You know what's scary? I suggest buying a car that you've only seen in pictures online!! We had test driven a similar model but it was pretty nerve wrecking to wait until Sunday to see if we'd made a good decision or had made a glaring judgement error. Happily, luck was on our side and our new ride is very sweet and very clean! We traded in Betty (my sensible 2010 Sentra that I bought brand new last year after my 2009 Sentra - that I also bought brand new - had been smashed into) for a 2009 RAV4 Limited with only 13k miles and all the "bells and whistles" we'd been looking for. Plus, it has lots of room to cart around baby stuff and still gets pretty decent mpgs.

On Saturday, we went to see a matinee showing of the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie at our favorite theater downtown. There were less than 10 other people in the theater. The movie was ok, I always like Johnny Depp but I think the other Pirates installments were better. I enjoyed the heck out of some movie popcorn and fountain cherry coke though! I mentioned to Joe that probably the next time we go to the movies, we'll have had to hire a babysitter. My intention was to get a lot done around the house on Saturday but can't say we accomplished much, I guess lazy days are nice here and there.

We woke up bright and early on Sunday, like kids at Christmas, excited about picking up our "new" SUV! Little did we know that the dealership didn't open until 1pm. In the meanwhile we did some baby room organizing and laundry but really nothing substantial. We picked up the RAV at 1:30 and as mentioned, we were quite pleased with our choice; we finished up some remaining paperwork at the dealership and were on our way. After that, we met up with my friend Lori for some tasty ice cream from Cold Stone Creamery and a bit of gossip swapping. I miss working with Lori terribly! We didn't actually work together per se, but our cubes were next to each other and we kept the instant messenger busy fairly often. Somehow, Joe and I still felt that we needed dinner even after all the yummy ice cream calories so Joe grilled some yummy shish-kabobs, made just how I like them: fresh pineapple alternating with thick chunks of steak soaked in jerk sauce. Delish!

Today, we installed Izaak's carseat and picked up some adirondack chairs from the grocery store (weird place to find patio chairs, yes? I agree, but they're perfect and our camping/beach chairs were getting too beat up from constantly being outside). We discovered that we could fit the two chairs in the car with a side table, the stroller, the Pack 'n Play, and groceries... with room to spare! This is very exciting if you're used to limited trunk space!! Joe finished peeling the "visible" linoleum from the kitchen floor today, quite a milestone considering how big of a project this has turned out to be. He still has to move the fridge, and washer and dryer to peel out the remaining linoleum and the pantry too but I don't think it'll take more than a couple more days to get the rest of it. The actual tiling of the floor really shouldn't take too long either. I don't know that it's going to be done before Izaak gets here but hopefully completion should be around the same time. Joe is going to take a couple days off (maybe a week?) of work for Izaak's arrival as well so he's thinking that he can possibly finish up the floor at that time if necessary. Let's hope!

I finally started one of the paintings for Izaak's room today too, it's one that I've had planned out for awhile but had yet to start. I had Joe put up the "octopus" painting in the living room that I started awhile ago. It's just a watery-looking background at this point - no visible octopus - but I actually like it pretty well the way that it is and am considering not adding the octopus. We'll see. I've made some decent progress on Izaak's painting and came into my office/studio/guest room to fetch some black paint when I decided to sit down and blog instead since some of the paint needed to dry anyhow. I setup in the living room to paint today so I could watch the Back to the Future trilogy while working on the art project and so Joe could listen to it too while working on the kitchen. We've seen the movies about 10 gazillion times so watching really isn't a necessity. Somewhere along the way, earlier this evening, I had curled up on the couch and fell asleep for awhile (watching paint dry truly is boring!) and Joe went to hang out with the barbecuing neighbors. I joined up a bit later but was getting eaten alive by the bugs so didn't stay long.

It's approximately 2 weeks until my due date and I have another routine doctor's appointment tomorrow. I'm going once a week now, yuck. I can't get used to being comfortable at the doctor's office. Every time I go, I still get anxious. Ridiculous! I tell myself to "grow up" and "deal with it" but I'm still a wuss. I had to have Joe cut my toenails the other day, reaching my own feet is no longer a comfortably accomplished task. Normal people probably go get pedicures but I keep on going back and forth on actually going to the nail salon as I'm not sure that I want to scare a foreign nail technician with my terribly sore and swollen Flintstone feet.

Anyhow, the house isn't as clean as I'd like it to be and I'm still behind on laundry (as if that would magically change? Who am I kidding, I'm always behind on laundry!!) but I think that I'd be ok if Izaak decides to make his grand entrance a little before the June 13th due date. Just putting it out there. Again, not that I really have any clue as to how to take care of an infant but I don't see how that knowledge is going to manifest itself in the next couple of weeks anyway. I read what I can but I think that hands-on training is what it's ultimately going to take. It would be so much easier if I knew the actual date of his arrival beforehand. I'm much better at budgeting time when I know when my deadlines are!!