Archive for May, 2008
Not yet
by aaron on May 31st, 2008
Not in the hospital or anything … burst of energy aside, no labor yet. We spent an hour yesterday at the pool … the water was freezing but we still managed to both get in and slow-dance for a bit, which was really really nice. In the future, Michelle would LOVE to have a water birth.
Even with tons to do, we didn’t get out of bed until 10am this morning, which was awesome. I hear we are going to need our rest for some reason :)
And I don’t know if I mentioned it before, but once baby arrives, I am taking three weeks off from work, which will be awesome. At first I only asked for two weeks, but then I thought about how from the time labor begins and we deliver and stay in the hospital for a couple days, that alone could all easily take up a week, or close to it. So I added in an additional week. It’ll be great being able to be at home with Michelle and the baby with very few distractions.
June 1st is tomorrow. The year is nearly half over. What the heck happened?
One week
by aaron on May 30th, 2008
The due date is exactly one short week from today. Michelle has been very tired and sleepy, and then she woke up early this morning with a burst of energy and may quite possibly be engaging in something called “nesting.” Many people have informed me to watch for this, as it could be a sign that things are about to start happening.
If this is the case, then it could very well have been brought about by the cup of Maggie Moo’s Better Batter with Strawberries I surprised her with last night. If so, we’ll be looking for an endorsement deal in the mail any week now :)
Unreal
by aaron on May 22nd, 2008
Things are very surreal right now. It would be hard for me to believe, without a kid on the way, that I’m 31 years old, I graduated college NINE years ago, that Michelle’s tiny little brothers are graduating high school tomorrow, we’re now in the 21st century (and only 7 years away from hoverboards, flying cars, and Mr. Fusion, according to Back to the Future) and that somehow, in some dimension of spacetime, it’s already the end of May, 2008.
But that disbelieve multiplies exponentially when it means that we are only two weeks away from our due date.
Did you catch that? Yeah, I said TWO WEEKS.
Remember when I started this blog and it was six months out? What in the world happened? Futureson could make an appearance literally any day now. I can’t wait for him to get here, but I still have no idea what to do with him once we bring him home. I imagine we’ll walk through the door and he’ll be a quiet dream of a baby, and maybe we can order in and rent a movie, and then hit the hay early after a long day’s work.
But I figure there will be a lot of staring involved. We have other friends with babies right now, and I catch myself just wanting to do nothing else in their presence but stare. But staring is rude, isn’t it? I really can’t see doing much else. Yes, there will be the feeding and the burping and the consoling and the diaper-changing and the rocking and bouncing … but I’m thinking there will mostly be staring.
Ketchup
by aaron on May 22nd, 2008
What do you call someone who designs a 64-page magazine in 3 days and a 52-page downtown guidebook in 3 more days, all while holding down a 20-hour-a-week job, attending birth & relaxation classes, occasionally eating and sleeping and trying to get the house ready for baby?
Someone who doesn’t have time to blog, that’s for sure.
But things are moving along well. Michelle is 60% effaced. Which is 10% more than last week. This is a weird thing: now that Michelle is to the point where it’s very obvious she’s pregnant, because the boy has dropped and is riding low in her belly and she looks like she might just pop any time now, she actually doesn’t get as much attention from strangers anymore. Now when she needs it the most, people while she’s out are more oblivious to the fact that it might be nice to hold the door open for a pregnant lady. Not that people are rude, but they seemed to “notice” more when she was “less pregnant.” Which I find very odd.
Michelle’s two brothers are graduating high school on Friday in Spring Hill, which we are super-excited about. We had been nervous about it since we knew it was happening so close to our due date, and we might not have been able to make it, but unless she goes into labor between now and tomorrow, we’ll be there.
And our friend Meredith is getting married in Illinois this Sunday … it sucks that we can’t be there for the wedding, because that’s something I wouldn’t have missed for anything. Except for the whole baby thing happening right now. But that’s why Jesus invented photography. And Michelle did an AMAZING cake top for her that she finished yesterday. Meredith and Josh standing on the Golden Gate Bridge (they live in San Fran).
We decided to NOT get carpet right now … our original idea was to replace the carpet in our bedroom and the nursery a couple months before baby got here, so that the place could air out, but obviously that just didn’t happen, and things are so crazy right now that we decided we don’t need the stress of moving everything out of a couple rooms on top of everything else. We will wait and get it all replaced AFTER the baby gets here. And since we’re wanting to labor at home, it would be less than ideal for Michelle to go into labor while the Lowe’s carpet team was here with all the carpet ripped up.
Monday is Memorial Day. I keep forgetting that.
Going to go the the Frist Museum on Sunday with some friends to catch the Monet to Dali exhibit before it skips town … and we’re also hoping to somehow catch the new Indy flick on the big screen before the baby’s born.
And I’m sitting here at work with a TON to do, and I’m trying to figure out why I am even writing all this. Do you really read blogs to find out what someone else is doing in their lives? I guess sometimes I do. I guess I am just wanting my son to read this one day and know what his mom and dad were doing around the time he was born.
Geeky side note:
American Idol finale was last night. We were suckers and were meeting with our moms and our doula instead of watching it, so we recorded it on DV-R. Well, American Idole finales tend to run long. Last year, our recording cut off before the winner was announced. This year, the two Davids were standing side by side, Ryan opened the enveloped, said something like “The winner is …” and he paused and said “David …” and paused, then opened his mouth to say the last name … and that’s when our recording cut off … i’m not joking, that’s where it would cut off if our life was a sitcom, and it happened in real life. Which is why I hate American Idol. 118 minutes of complete crap for 2 minutes of payoff, and they run long every time. So we had to look online to find out that David Cook (our favorite) won. I’m surprised too. I never liked Archuletta until the last two weeks of the competition. Nice kid, I’m sure, but every song sounds like karo syrup. But I thought he was going to win. Like a couple years ago when Daughtry, who was clearly the best singer they had, only came in fourth, and then went out and sold a million records, i thought Cook would do the same. But then he went and won the thing.
Anyway, I’m off now to a meeting …
Some things I’m looking forward to
by aaron on May 18th, 2008
• to kissing his forehead and making his eyes close
• to carry him around at art shows in my Baby Bjorn
• to see him look at me for the first time
• to play him songs on the guitar
• to see Michelle hold him and sing You Are My Sunshine
• to drive him home from the hospital like a 90-year-old granny
• to see how my paintings will change
• to see what it’s like eating at a restaurant with a baby
• to read him Shel Silverstein
• to teach him the hook shot
• to take his picture
• to put some socks on his little feet
• to take him to the beach
• to take him everywhere
Like it’s hot
by aaron on May 16th, 2008
We do believe the baby has dropped. Or at least he’s in the process of dropping. This means he’s no longer up high, but he’s making his way down, readying himself for escape. Michelle’s belly looks a lot different than it did a few days ago. We’re in a very surreal state right now. It’s so close.
Which reminds me that Michelle is officially Full Term today (37 weeks). The past 37 weeks has seemed both like a very long time and only a blink. Even though our due date isn’t for three more weeks (as if that’s a long time), we are well aware that in reality, we could be driving to the hospital any day now. We’re officially on Baby Watch.
Around the corner
by aaron on May 14th, 2008
And that corner is approaching really, really quickly. Our son is getting restless and is wanting out, I believe. Michelle is effacing at an alarming rate (*note: the fact that she’s effacing at all is alarming to me … I’m sure the rate at which this is happening is perfectly normal … but it’s just a sign that he’s comin’ round the mountain).
Last night Michelle was spending more time than normal rearranging our bedroom (with my help) and paying very close attention to the details. She’s detail-oriented anyway, but we were both thinking the same thing, “you’re not nesting are you?” Nesting is a great thing, and supposedly happens right before baby. So last night we took a 9′x12′ drop cloth and wrapped it around our mattress, under the sheets, in case her water breaks in the middle of the night.
Yesterday at our visit, we shared our birth plan with our doctor. We weren’t too nervous, but this can be a touchy thing, because basically, in our quest to deliver naturally, we are requesting things that not everyone in medicine/hospital/epidural land is used to, even though we’re certainly not being crazy or ultra-demanding about anything. We just have things that we prefer, and we felt it was a good idea to go over them beforehand with our doc. She was incredibly cool about it all. She’s terrific and laid back. She didn’t really see any reason why we couldn’t have the baby the way we want. (In fact, Michelle designed the Plan so beautifully, that the doc took it around and showed it to the nurses) Lots of the things on our plan that we do not want, she doesn’t really do anyway. But at the same time, we’re not anti-doctor or anti-drugs … we just want to be given a fair opportunity not to be rushed and to let nature take its course. At first the idea of delivering without drugs seemed insane to me. Back in the Old West they gave you whiskey and a bullet before hacking your leg off with a dull machete. Then God invented drugs. Why would you go back to the no-drug days? But then after talking to some people and doing lots of thinking and research, and witnessing how amazing the human body is if you just let it do its thing (along with all the potential risks that come with interventions), and most importantly, the fact that Michelle really wants to have a natural birth, I am now 100% for it. So that’s why we’re taking natural birthing technique classes. The general classes at the hospital were great, but they weren’t nearly in-depth enough when it came to this kind of thing.
We are going to labor at home as long as possible before going to the hospital. I can’t tell you “how long” but I guess we and the doula will know when it’s time to get in the car and go.
Note to Futureson: I know I’m a little crazy sometimes and talk about how the house isn’t ready and I have too much work to do, etc … but please know that I’m just a perfectionist who’s not very perfect, and only want this place to be sparkling like a palace when you get here. If you got here tomorrow, everything else would slink into the background. Whenever you decide to show up, your mother and I will be the happiest people on the planet. Our door will always be open and our porch light will always be on.
Figuratively, of course. That’s also how bugs get in.
Once a week
by aaron on May 13th, 2008
Starting today at 1:05, we will be be going to the doctor once a week … it began once a month, then moved to every other week, and i remember thinking when we get to our weekly visits, that’ll mean we’re REALLY close … and here we are.
I have less than three minutes
by aaron on May 12th, 2008
I’m feeling so sleepy and excited and overwhelmed … good things, bad things happening. Only weeks away from The Great Arrival, I’m getting up anywhere between 5 and 6:30am at the latest. Finally forcing ourselves to go to bed around 10 or so. No TV in the bedroom anymore, so no Conan anymore either. Bedroom looks great blue now (thank God for Anna and Chris) … hopefully new carpet in our near future. Had a great and exciting meeting today at Fido with someone who will have a great impact on my future … more details in the coming months I hope.
Pizza done, gotta run.
